randomwalks/dj

I was in for a very pleasant surprise today.  While at Powell's on Hawthorne, I was looking at their information board, filled with upcoming events and new releases, when I saw a listing under Rare Books that said a copy of J.D. Salinger's Twenty-Two Stories was going for $450. 

I blinked.

Then I walked over to the rare book case and saw a wrapped copy of what looked exactly like my copy of Twenty-Two Stories, which I bought at Reading Frenzy in 1998.  For $10. 

I went over and asked the guy behind the information desk if there was something unique about the copy in the cabinet, like if it was a hardback or a special edition or something.  He said nope.  He then began reminding me that it was essentially a bootleg, an unauthorized printing of which only 1000 copies were actually produced.  He said if I had one, I had the real deal.  "You should've bought 10 of them," he said.  Indeed.

The book itself is navy blue, with no writing on it, and a white sleeve that slides over the top that has the title and author on one side and a description and chronology of the stories on the back.  There's about a 3/4 inch tear in my sleeve, but otherwise is in great condition.  I'd love to open it up and look at some of the stories now - "Wake Me When It Thunders" was a favorite - but now I'm afraid to damage that sleeve any further.  With the exception of a few other first editions and signed books, I'm not used to owning anything of real value.

(Perhaps it's only fitting, then, that I went to see Slumdog Millionaire tonight.  Although I thought it was beautifully directed, I seem to be the only person in the world that thought it was just okay.) 

On the way home from Powell's, I came across Chinese dragon dancers, fireworks and all, outside of the Monkey King celebrating the Year of the Ox.  So I thought it would be fun to look up my Chinese horoscope (I'm the Year of the Pig - jokes to yourselves, please) for 2009, and it's quite funny. It seems to directly answer my dilemma of earlier this week, which I burdened some of you with as well -  that is, do I take advantage of the great British Airways Seattle - London deal for $178 (one way) in this economy?  i decided against it, and my horoscope agrees, telling me to earn, not spend.  Specifically, it says "Do what you are best at Piggy: buy items of enduring value", such as "paintings and sculptures."

Or books, perhaps?

Originally posted by Valarie Smith from Crazed Teacups, on January 24, 2009 9:36 PM

Listable.org

I had this idea almost 4 years ago and since my New Year's resolution is build it or let the domain expire, I went ahead and built it on Google App Engine with CherryPy because they both make making things fun.

Basically I wanted a way to have some lists handy that I usually end up converting to some other format, this is that. I'm going to be rich.

Originally posted by torrez from Andre's Notes, on January 24, 2009 2:18 PM

I have some love/hate issues with Michael Lewis as a writer. He's clearly insanely talented at finding and telling a great story. On a structural level, I heavily borrowed from Moneyball to organize Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good. If you look closely-- and I don't know why anyone ever would-- Max Levchin = Billy Beane as the spine of the book. The different various entrepreneurs rotate into the narrative the way, individual A's players rotate in to Moneyball. The philosophy of Web 2.0 provides the narrative glue, the way the philosophy of A's baseball provides the narrative glue of Moneyball. It's really borderline shameless.

But one thing I do not borrow from Lewis is his love of putting himself in his books. Ever since Liar's Poker I've found it incredibly self-congratulatory. I know people think I love to promote myself, but note there are about four occurrences of first person in my entire book and each is a passing reference making a bigger point about one of the subjects. Bottom line: If you come to a blog called SarahLacy.com, expect to read about me. If you pick up a book about entrepreneurs, expect to read about them.

So it's not surprising I had mixed feelings about Lewis' recent interview in The Atlantic. (Which, BTW, I'm subscribing to, because I keep getting linked to awesome Atlantic pieces.) The delightfully sassy reporter asked Lewis about the magazine industry, a timely topic, give that ad pages were horrific in the fourth quarter. Lewis smugly responded that he was faring just fine. Exact words below, the reporter in bold:

"And so I wonder what you think about that industry changing over the next couple of years. Especially since you're a guy who does long-form journalism and books, and those are arguably things that translate less well to the internet.

Well my personal experience has been very nice. The market for me has only gotten better!

[Laughs] That's not terribly helpful.

Well it makes it a little hard for me to prophesize doom. And I hate spinning theories to which I'm an exception. So my sense is, there'll always be a hunger for long-form journalism, and that it's just a question of how it's packaged. And that people will always figure out how to make it sort of viable. It's never going to be a hugely profitable business: it's more like the movie business or the car business in that there are all sorts of good non-economic reasons to be involved in it. The economic returns will always probably be driven down by too many people wanting to be in it.
 
But I don't feel gloomy about the magazine business at all.

Well that's nice! I feel pretty gloomy.

It's always inherently in a state of turmoil of one form or another. But let me put it this way: when I write a long magazine piece that gets attention I feel like it's more widely read now than it was ten years ago, by a long way. In fact, it feels excessively well read. Twenty years ago I might get a couple of notes in the mail and I'd hear about it maybe at a dinner party. And that would be the end of it, and it would go away very quickly. Ten years ago it would get passed around by email, and it would seem to have a life to me that would go on a little longer. Now the blogosphere picks it up and it becomes almost like a book: it lives for months. I'm getting responses to it for months. And I don't think the journalism has gotten any better. It's just the environment you publish it in is more able to rapidly get it to the people who are or might be interested in it. They're more likely to see it. So the demand side of things is not a problem. People really want to read this stuff. The question is how you monetize that."

Oh, it's just how to monetize it? Phew, I thought the industry had a real problem. Here's the thing: Lewis isn't wrong about his career; he's wrong to think it in any way reflects what media is facing in the aggregate. Yes, he is doing well and his pieces are more widely read, but that's because Lewis is one of the top writers in his field, and his fame just happens to parallel the increasing media calamity of the past few decades. Business being good for him is a reality, but it has zero to do with the state of media. 

So it comes across as incredibly smug to shrug off the widespread problems that almost all journalists who don't happen to be Michael Lewis are facing. Yes, even incredibly talented and successful ones.

That said, there's an important lesson in what he says: Even in the bleakest economic times, people at the top of their game still do well. While good times lift all boats, the inverse isn't true. It's a reminder to me to stop looking around at the broader economic collapse and panic. Rather, focus on content, content, content and pretend I'm living in my own Michael-Lewis-like bubble, until my income tells me otherwise. It's that fine line between letting panic hobble you and uttering famous last words you'll come to regret.

Originally posted by sarah lacy from SarahLacy.com, on January 24, 2009 11:30 AM

Last night, less than 48 hours after George Bush left office, whistleblower and former NSA analyst Russell Tice revealed new information about the NSA's warrantless wiretapping program:

Countdown begins the segment with an appropriate clip of Ex-President Bush's December 2005 talk on wiretapping, in which he claimed that the only communications being intercepted were those with "a clear link to terrorist networks."

Tice, in his role as an NSA analyst, quickly came to understand that this just wasn't true:

I don't know what our former president knew or didn't know. I'm sort of down in the weeds. But the National Security Agency had access to all Americans' communications, faxes, phone calls, and their computer communications. And that doesn't -- it didn't matter whether you were in Kansas, you know, in the middle of the country, and you never made a communication -- foreign communications at all. They monitored all communications.

Tice also reveals how NSA officials lied to Congress and others in order to avoid oversight:

TICE: One of the things that could be done was you could take something that was part of the Department of Defense, make it part of the intelligence community, and put a caveat to that, and make that whatever the intelligence community is doing for support will ultimately be given a different caveat. So when the defense committees on the Hill come calling, you say, you can't look at that because that's an intelligence program.

OLBERMANN: Right.

TICE: But when the intelligence program comes calling, you say you can't look at that because it is a Department of Defense program.

OLBERMANN: Right.

TICE: So you basically have a little shell game that you are playing back and forth.

The interview is riveting and full of other revealations. Olbermann promises us a follow-up interview with Tice tonight. MSNBC.com has the video and FishbowlDC has the transcript.

Originally posted by tim from EFF.org Updates, ReBlogged by josephdelpesco on Jan 24, 2009 at 10:39 AM

Originally posted by tim from Eyebeam reBlog, on January 24, 2009 5:39 AM

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, Software, Odds and ends, iPhone, iPod touch

We actually heard this last year, straight from Apple, but here's confirmation: PopCap Games has told our sister site Joystiq that Peggle, the distractingly cute-looking yet extremely addictive puzzle shooter, is coming to the iPhone in March of this year. If you've played Peggle (or any of PopCap's games, really) you'll know why this is so exciting, and if you haven't yet played it, you'll be in for a treat.

Word of the game apparently sneaked out via Popcap's official Twitter account, and while it was originally deleted (someone decided they didn't want to talk about it yet), the company later confirmed the game and the month of release. Of course, the game is currently available on the classic iPod, but it'll be that much better with touch-screen goodness added in. Extreme Fever!

TUAWPeggle coming to the iPhone in March originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sat, 24 Jan 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Originally posted by Mike Schramm from The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW), on January 24, 2009 3:00 AM

A minor earthquake occurred at 7:42:44 PM (PST) on Friday, January 23, 2009.
The magnitude 3.4 event occurred 2 km (1 miles) WNW of Marina del Rey, CA.
The hypocentral depth is 7 km ( 5 miles).

Magnitude 3.4 - local magnitude (ML)

Time Friday, January 23, 2009 at 7:42:44 PM (PST), Saturday, January 24, 2009 at 3:42:44 (UTC)

Distance from Marina del Rey, CA - 2 km (1 miles) WNW (288 degrees) Santa Monica, CA - 4 km (3 miles) SSE (166 degrees) Culver City, CA - 7 km (4 miles) WSW (248 degrees) Inglewood, CA - 12 km (7 miles) WNW (285 degrees) Los Angeles Civic Center, CA - 22 km (14 miles) WSW (249 degrees)

Coordinates 33 deg. 59.0 min. N (33.984N), 118 deg. 28.2 min. W (118.470W)

Depth 7.4 km (4.6 miles)

Location Quality Fair

Location Quality Parameters Nst=113, Nph=113, Dmin=4 km, Rmss=0.5 sec, Erho=0.5 km, Erzz=0.9 km, Gp=46.8 degrees

Event ID# ci10373093

Originally posted by hustler of culture from hustler of culture, on January 23, 2009 5:42 PM

From Recipes

Before the holiday season, I noticed my growing cookbook collection was severely lacking any titles by Mark Bittman. I made it known to friends and family that filling this gap was a priority. Now with the holidays and my birthday behind me, my library is pretty Bittman-heavy. Rummaging through such a bounty of new recipes can be daunting, so I'm taking a methodical approach. My first course of action is to flip to the index of How to Cook Everything and see what grilling treasures lie within.

A recipe for grilled leeks perked my interest as an accompaniment to the Korean-style steaks on my menu. The Bittman recipe called for the leeks to be grilled over high heat until tender, then topped with a fairly standard vinaigrette, but to better fit my dinner, I replaced some of the vinaigrette's ingredients with Asian counterparts.

A mixture of shallots, rice vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, red pepper flakes, Chinese spicy mustard, and olive oil topped my leeks after coming off the grill. Although the flavors fit rather seamlessly into my meal, I piled the vinaigrette on a little too heavily, which overpowered the delicate oniony flavor of the leeks. A mere drizzle, or a simple brush of soy sauce as recommended by Bittman, would have sufficed and made these leeks a perfect side.

About the author: Joshua Bousel blogs about grilling on his blog, The Meatwave, and appears weekly here on Serious Eats during grilling season.

Grilled Leeks with Asian Vinaigrette

Adapted from How to Cook Everything by Mark Bitmann
- serves 4 -

Ingredients

3 or 4 leeks, split, trimmed and cleaned
Dark Sesame Oil
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon Chinese spicy mustard
1 medium shallot, minced
1 large clove of garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Procedure

1. Heat grill to high heat. While the grill is heating, brush leeks lightly with sesame oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

2. Grill leeks, turning occasionally, until nicely browned all over and very tender, 5 to 15 minutes.

3. Meanwhile, whisk together the olive oil, vinegar, soy sauce, mustard, shallot, garlic, and red pepper flakes. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

4. Drizzle the vinaigrette over the leeks just before serving. Serve hot, warm, or at room temperature.

Originally posted by Joshua Bousel from Serious Eats, on January 23, 2009 1:30 PM

After several important fixes to our patches we made binaries for build12.

Fixes include:

Control of InnoDB insert buffer to address problems Peter mentioned http://www.mysqlperformanceblog.com/2009/01/13/some-little-known-facts-about-innodb-insert-buffer/, also check Bug 41811 to see symptoms of problem with Insert buffer.

http://www.percona.com/docs/wiki/patches:innodb_io_patches

* innodb_flush_neighbor_pages (default 1) - When the dirty page are flushed (written to datafile), this parameter determines whether the neighbor pages in the datafile are also flushed at the same time or not. If you use the storage which don't have “head seek delay” (e.g. SSD or enough Write-Buffered), 0 may show better performance. 0:disable, 1:enable

* innodb_ibuf_max_size (default [the half of innodb_buffer_pool_size](bytes)) - This parameter is startup parameter. If the lower value is set than the half of innodb_buffer_pool_size, it is used as maximum size of insert buffer. To restrict to the too small value (e.g. 0) is not recommended for performance. If you don't like the insert buffer growing bigger, you should use the following parameters instead. (* If you use very fast storage, small value (like several MB) may show better performance.)

* innodb_ibuf_accel_rate (default 100(%)) - This parameter is additional tuning the amount of insert buffer processing by background thread. Sometimes, only innodb_io_capacity is insufficient to tune the insert buffer.

* innodb_ibuf_active_contract (default 0) - By default (same to normal InnoDB), the each user threads do nothing about contracting the insert buffer until the insert buffer reaches its maximum size. 1 makes the each user threads positive to contract the insert buffer as possible in asynchronous.

Second important fix introduces variable use_global_long_query_time, which allows all current threads see change of long_query_time. By default value set in SET GLOBAL long_query_time=N command is visible only on new established connection, which is problem if you have pre-established connection pool, say in Java or Ruby on Rails application. With use_global_long_query_time=true even all current threads will respect SET GLOBAL long_query_time=N. The feature made for EngineYard, hosting provider for Ruby on Rails application.

You can download binaries (RPMS x86_64) and sources with patches here
http://www.percona.com/mysql/5.0.75-b12/

---

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Originally posted by Vadim from MySQL Performance Blog, on January 23, 2009 1:01 PM

Another federal employee checks in from the trenches:

I work at the Department of Education headquarters in DC. Today completed our 2-day introduction to Arne Duncan. Yesterday he had lunch in our cafeteria (Edibles, ha ha), with his wife and children. His wife wore jeans and a sweater and Arne looked like an average joe in khaki dress pants, white shirt and tie. They stood in all of the lines and talked to anyone who approached them. They probably stayed 90 minutes. It was definitely the highest cafeteria attendance ever.

Yesterday afternoon he visited every floor of our building and introduced himself to everyone. We all came out into the hall and he shook everyone's hand with a "Hi, I'm Arne."

By the end of the day yesterday, everyone was aglow, since this was already more attention than we'd received from Spellings or Paige. Today, however, was the all-staff meeting, and I can say that the morale in the building increased ten-fold by the end of it.

Our auditorium was beyond packed, with people standing in the aisles. I myself snagged a seat on the floor next to the stage kindergarten-style. Arne stood in front of a blue screen that read "Call me Arne!" in bright yellow letters. He insisted that we call him Arne, rather than Mr. Secretary or anything like that, saying his name was Arne before he got this job and it would be 8 years from now.

...

I know this isn't anything earthshattering, but the change in the atmosphere at the Department over the last week has been really astounding. In the past, we all knew that the Secretary had an agenda that she was going to follow, and that we were only there to affirm that her way was best. We really feel that Arne wants to know the truth, whether it fits with his agenda or not.

Originally posted by David Kurtz from Talking Points Memo, on January 23, 2009 12:44 PM

If you're not reading Ze's blog the explicit, you should be. In today's post, Notes on Scale, he remembers visiting a newspaper printing press as a child....

There was a huge metal drum that spun so fast that the just-inked newspaper pages were a blur of streaked grey. I could feel that drum. The floor shook. The noise was enormous. I imagined that if that drum became unhinged it would tear a neat-violent path through the whole city. It was awesome, in the old sense of the word. But then I looked down at my watch. And I saw that tiny little second hand.

Tick.

The fact that those two moments could coexist was overwhelming. Almost nauseating. And I am drawn to this feeling in the same way that I can’t help biting a sore lip.

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 23, 2009 12:22 PM

Coincidentia oppositorum is a Latin phrase meaning coincidence of opposites. It is a neoplatonic term attributed to 15th century German polymath Nicholas of Cusa in his essay, De Docta Ignorantia (1440). Mircea Eliade, a 20th century historian of religion, used the term extensively in his essays about myth and ritual, describing the coincidentia oppositorum as "the mythical pattern". Psychiatrist Carl Jung, philosopher and Islamic Studies professor Henry Corbin as well as Jewish philosopher Gershom Scholem also used the term. In alchemy, coincidentia oppositorum is a synonym for conjunction, the fifth process.

The term is also used in describing a revelation of the oneness of things previously believed to be different. Such insight into the unity of things is a kind of transcendence, and is found in various mystical traditions. The idea occurs in the traditions of German mysticism and Buddhism, among others.

From the Wikipedia entry on Unity of Opposites

Symbols of coincidentia oppositorium: the crucifix, the mandala, the wheel, the flower, the ourobouros, yin/yang.

Originally posted by caterina from Caterina.net, on January 23, 2009 11:51 AM

In the very early 1900's, there was still lots of traffic on N Cayuga St, the location of our original Gimme! Coffee espresso bar. In this historic photo, we're looking northwest at Cascadilla Creek flowing toward Cayuga Lake under the Cayuga St bridge. Our first Gimme opened on the corner of Cascadilla and N Cayuga St in 2001, about 100 years after this photo was taken.

Originally posted by Janet Murray from Gimme! Coffee News, on January 23, 2009 11:44 AM

Now that the election is over, and the holidays are over, and capitalism is over, you know what the world needs?

…something to talk about, something delightful.

What the world needs now is Plinky!. Fortunately, it just launched. And you can get in there right now.

Plinky gives you a prompt. It could be a question, a poll, a challenge. You write a response. Your friends write responses. You read them. They amuse you. You discuss them. There, your day is a little better and so is the interweb.

We had the absolute pleasure of providing our design services to Plinky. Ryan Freitas and Jason Shellen, and the whole rest of the team, are hell-bent on inspiring people to amuse and enlighten each other. Especially those people who are intimidated by “professional bloggers” (They discuss their cats with such passion.)

So, take a look. I think you’ll like it!

Originally posted by erika from Mule Design : Off the Hoof, on January 23, 2009 11:10 AM

-Photo by Getty Images-
You know what? I don't care anymore!

Actually I really cared very little if Tom Brady and Gisele Bunchen had decided to get married, but now that there have been two, count 'em, two fake stories about their engagement, I've completely lost interest.

"I don't know how people are so creative," Gigi told Brazilian magazine Caras Gi during São Paulo Fashion Week. "First they said he proposed to me in a plane. Imagine, it was Dec. 24, Christmas, we were flying to Boston, then there was some champagne and we celebrated the date.

"Ready? Someone deduced I was getting engaged! I received more than 100 e-mails from friends commenting about the proposal," she went on. "Now there's a new rumor, that he proposed to me on last Friday [sic]. I wasn't even there, how can that be true?"

So they're not engaged -- again.

Originally posted by Tracy Pepey from iVillage - Daily Blabber, on January 23, 2009 11:03 AM

All the dev team had after month of effort was a black triangle on a screen...but it was more than that.

Afterwards, we came to refer to certain types of accomplishments as "black triangles." These are important accomplishments that take a lot of effort to achieve, but upon completion you don't have much to show for it -- only that more work can now proceed. It takes someone who really knows the guts of what you are doing to appreciate a black triangle.

When working on complex projects, the black triangle moment is always the high point for me; it's when success occurs. Before you've got a framework built, there's significant doubt about how the project will turn out, if can even be done. After you get that first little result through the whole maze and it's clear how the whole thing will work, the rest becomes almost inevitable. (via migurski)

Tags: language

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 23, 2009 10:34 AM

by Covert Curiosity

The first word that comes to mind when I try to describe Diagonals is, radical. The Austin five-piece perfectly blends many different things. Garage-surf-gaze guitars, an uber-infectious organ sound, danceable rock beats, touches of psychedelic reverb, all added on top of "twisted deadpan lyrics that conjure an odd mixture of optimism and doom." Their debut LP, Valley of the Cyclops, will be available February 28th on iTunes and at monofonuspress.com. They also have a 5-track EP you can download right the second. Try on two of the new jams below, and hear more at myspace. [...]

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Diagonals at Elbo.ws, on January 23, 2009 10:20 AM

In 2002 I lived in an apartment on East 7th St. between C and D, which is one of those magical multitude-containing East Village blocks that that, at least then, was just old tenement buildings, no prefab towers.  I hadn’t been in a lot of apartments at that point in my career of living in New York and I assumed that probably every other apartment on the block was nicer than the one I lived in, which actually might have been the case. Well, there was nothing so horribly wrong with the apartment, really — it was just much too small for three people and all of their clothes and scavenged art objects and smoking habits and boyfriends.

During the time that I lived in this apartment I had a recurring dream.  I would wake up in my bedroom and go out into the common area where I’d find that the wall opposite the door to the tiny bathroom had sprouted a new door, the same way a damp log might sprout a toadstool overnight.  Then I would open the door and walk through it.  At this point the dream would branch out into a series of variations, none of which were all that interesting.  My subconscious isn’t any less hacky than my conscious mind in terms of inventing fictitious scenarios.  In one version of the Secret New Room Dream, the Secret New Room contained a sunny kitchen table with a vase of tulips and a newspaper, and the date on the newspaper was ten years in the past!  That was how viewers of my dream would be able to tell that I had time-traveled.  Good one, brain.

Anyway, you can make a case for this dream’s being a quintessentially New Yorky dream for two sort of conflicting reasons.  1) is the obvious Style Section reason: in a town where you often find yourself close enough to strangers to smell their personal aromas and where sometimes the only place where you’re alone is the bathroom, your number one fantasy is of course finding a secret space.   2) is the less obvious: You find secret doors all the time in New York, actually.  You walk a different route than usual and suddenly you might as well be in a different world.  There’s all this new stuff and your mind has to re-index the map it has made of whatever neighborhood you’re in.   That stuff exists now where there used to just be grey fog, out beyond the border of what used to be the whole universe.

I was thinking about this yesterday when I walked Doree’s dog Lee to a park that’s just on the other side of the BQE from my house.   I live just at the edge of what can be credibly called “Clinton Hill” and not “Navy Yard,” and in the 7 months I’ve lived here, I’ve only walked and biked in the direction of Clinton Hill and beyond (south) and Williamsburg (west).   The map in my head of the other direction (north) was like one of those Saul Steinberg New Yorker maps and it read: BQE. Orthodox Jews.  Storage Space.  Other Stuff. East River. Manhattan.

It turns out that the Other Stuff — keep in mind that this is three blocks from where I live and I’d had no idea it existed — includes Steiner Studios, which is the biggest soundstage on this coast and they made Baby Mama there et cetera.  The entrance to it is very grandiose and imposing!  Their website says that the campus includes “a rich, historic back-lot, with buildings preserved from the Civil War and World War II, and an open campus environment with winding drives, expansive fields and abundant landscaping.”  Also you can have your super fancy wedding there, there’s a ballroom and a roofdeck with crazy views of the three surrounding bridges and the Manhattan skyline.  You can see some of the historic buildings as you walk down Flushing towards the dilapidated ad hoc dog run in Steuben Playground.   There’s a tantalizingly low fence with big signs that say GOVERNMENT PROPERTY NO TRESPASSING.

While we were romping around in the snow I started smelling a delicious toasty bread smell.   I wasn’t having a stroke: there is a baked-stuff factory across the street from the playground.  As Lee and I left we walked past it and the workers were loading cartons of bagels the height of a two-story building into the back of a giant truck.   On the sidewalk, a huge flock of pigeons had gathered to eat the crumbs they’d just swept out onto the grimy snow.

It smelled like fresh bagels and car exhaust and melting snow, and as we walked by a million pigeons flapped off into the blinding snow-reflected sunlight.  What an awesome city.  I’m not being sarcastic.

Also in this factory/vegetable warehouse/rustic Navy Yard bar area it is extra bizarre to walk down Washington Ave. between Park and Flushing and find this weird Potemkin village there that I guess is for the benefit of Steiner workers. It includes a Chase branch, a fancy furniture store, a Cuban restaurant named ‘Mojito,’ and a brick oven pizzeria.  Seriously I had no idea.   That is what’s behind the secret door:  a Cuban restaurant (they serve brunch!)

Originally posted by emily from Emily Magazine, on January 23, 2009 10:14 AM

kottke blue begone

Originally posted by (author unknown) from the real janelle, on January 23, 2009 9:58 AM

I love Kanye's blog, because it offers up gems like this line from a recent post about how he just can't have nice things (via Idolator):

YOOOO WHY WON'T YOU LET ME BE GREAT!!!

Originally posted by btrott from Stupidfool.org, on January 23, 2009 9:32 AM

DUMBO: Many Brooklyn Flea goers have grown concerned that the new pop-up version of the market, The Winter Antiques Market at 76 Front Street in Dumbo, lacks one vital group of vendors: the food vendors. Luckily, Racked brings the news that Flea co-founder Eric Demby has already found a solution to that problem by expanding into a space across the street:

"That space will open the weekend of January 31st, and will offer new (non-antique) clothing and accessories and—this is very exciting—food vendors like Kumquat Cupcakery, McClure's Pickles, Hot Blondies Bakery, Choice Market and Fine + Raw Chocolate. There's even talk of a BBQ truck."

If only they could get those Red Hook vendors in until the new season. The pop-up market should be open through April when everyone moves back to the original Fort Greene space.
· Brooklyn Flea Jumps on New Dumbo Space [Racked]
· Eater Food Tour: Sunday's Brooklyn Flea [~E~]

Originally posted by Amanda from Eater, on January 23, 2009 9:23 AM

I'm listening to Sen. Jim Webb on MSNBC talking about the outlook for the Stimulus bill. The anchors are pressing him on whether 100% of the money will be spent in 1 year or 18 months. And Webb is responding that he doesn't think that should be our exclusive focus, that his models are the big New Deal-era building programs. He went on to note that you drive around the entire country and you continually see roads, dams, all sorts of infrastructure that still makes up the bones of the country and keeps driving economic growth after almost eighty years. More common sense like that.

Originally posted by Josh Marshall from Talking Points Memo, on January 23, 2009 9:09 AM

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Fashionista, on January 23, 2009 9:07 AM

Greg Allen raises a good point regarding the new White House web site: why did the old site get completely erased?

It seems problematic to me that the entire official web presence of the Bush administration, as tainted and manipulative or enraging as you may think it is, just gets wiped clean from the web like that. People need to remember, reference, discuss, and link to that publicly owned, previously published information; it shouldn't be tossed to the curb like a dead plant or buried in the National Archive backup tape repository.

Perhaps there needs to be a simple directory structure put in place, something like:

whitehouse.gov/42
whitehouse.gov/43
whitehouse.gov/44

The files for each President's site would live under the associated directory and would never need to be taken down to make room for new files. Of course, maintaining all that, and the different systems and platforms potentially used by each administration would be a total PITA.

Update: Here are the Clinton whitehouse.gov archive and the George W. Bush whitehouse.gov archive. Nice but they don't address the broken links issue and snapshots don't capture any dynamic functions (like search, for instance). Also, shouldn't every page on the site function like a wiki so you can go back and see the history at any time? Quite a few people suggested using subdomains (e.g. 43.whitehouse.gov) instead of directories to keep everything straight; I concur. (thx, arnold & kate)

Tags: gregallen politics www barackobama georgewbush

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 23, 2009 7:49 AM

According to Andrew Marchand of 1050 ESPN New York, “the Mets will eventually be willing to go to four years for Oliver Perez,” and that they are gaining interest in RHP Ben Sheets, whose arm they don’t think is “perfect, but not terrible either.”

Marchand writes that the Perez negotiations will not be finished anytime soon. Sheets, according to Ken Rosenthal, met with the Texas Rangers with his agent last night.

…one figured that once Derek Lowe went off the market for four years, the Mets would be forced to go four years for Perez, which seems to be the case now… still, if they think Sheets’ arm is okay, why not go in that direction for one or two years…

Originally posted by Jordan Zakarin from MetsBlog.com, on January 23, 2009 7:08 AM

Today we’re rolling out a beta release of NYPL Mobile (http://m.nypl.org/), a miniaturized version of our site for iPhones and other mobile devices. We have noticed a small but growing number of mobile visitors to our web sites, and this new site is an effort to launch a platform on which we can experiment with ways of delivering content to users via the tiny screen.

Obviously, a mobile web site cannot convey the full range of information available on NYPL.org. But as we make progress on the upcoming Big Redesign of NYPL.org, it’s been an interesting exercise to decide what to include in the mobile version,  since it forces us to think about what information is most critical. Stats analysis has shown that our current mobile users are most often looking for quick transactional information– hours, locations, directions, and so on, so the top link leads to a list of library locations, with addresses, hours, and maps linked prominently. The calendar of daily events, from long-running exhibitions to toddler story time, is also easily accessible and updated automatically twice a day.

Additionally, stats show that mobile users are looking for books, unsurprisingly. To that end, we have added a page of mobile-formatted searchforms for four of our catalog. Currently, only Catnyp, our research catalog, returns results in a mobile-friendly format; for the others, you will be redirected to the “regular” search results pages. Making the catalog more mobile-friendly will probably happen towards the end of 2009. As for making My Account more accessible (reserves, renewals, etc.), we’ll see how it goes… the degree of difficulty goes way up for those features!

The application itself was built in our spare time, and should be considered a very rough beta. Location hours are not updated dynamically, and holiday closures are not indicated (this will probably be the first improvement we add, given the importance of locations and hours to the mobile users). There’s a Help and Frequently Asked Questions section, but it’s mostly a blank placeholder right now. Look for it to be filled in in a couple of weeks when our new interns arrive.

As far as formatting and testing goes, the site was built and tested on an Apple iPhone, but the underlying HTML was constructed to be very simple, and should degrade nicely on older/smaller mobile browsers. That said, we don’t have any testing budget for this thing. If you have a web-enabled phone or PDA and you run into trouble, or simply have suggestions, please send us feedback (the feedback page is accessible from any browser if you dislike typing on the tiny screen).

Originally posted by Michael Lascarides from NYPL Labs, on January 23, 2009 6:10 AM

“There is an extraordinary breadth and depth and tenure among the Apple executive team, and these executives lead over 35,000 employees that I would call “all wicked smart”. And that’s in all areas of the company, from engineering to marketing to operations and sales and all the rest. And the values of our company are extremely well entrenched. We believe that we’re on the face of the Earth to make great products, and that’s not changing. We’re constantly focusing on innovating. We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution. We believe in saying no to thousands of projects so that we can really focus on the few that are truly important and meaningful to us. We believe in deep collaboration and cross-pollination of our groups, which allow us to innovate in a way that others cannot. And frankly, we don’t settle for anything less than excellence in every group in the company, and we have the self-honesty to admit when we’re wrong and the courage to change. And I think, regardless of who is in what job, those values are so embedded in this company that Apple will do extremely well.”

- Tim Cook’s View of the Apple Philosophy - Mac Rumors

Originally posted by (author unknown) from stream of me, on January 23, 2009 6:00 AM

Simon Hoegsberg has taken a photo that's 100 meters long. It's actually several dozen photos stitched together into one big one. A good idea nicely executed. (thx, everyone)

Tags: simonhoegsberg photography

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 23, 2009 4:17 AM

Pirating the 2009 Oscars Metafilter's own waxpancake gives us an exhaustive analysis of the current crop of Oscar nominees, and how many of their releases are available via Bittorrent. With spreadsheets!

Originally posted by the dief from MetaFilter posts tagged with copyright, on January 22, 2009 4:42 PM

Toys’R'Us has a new Pokemon download coming in February: Shaymin!

Yes, you heard me correctly. The mega toy retailer will be hosting a Pokemon download event between the dates of February 8th and the 14th.

Up until now Shaymin has been impossible to acquire in the US without cheating or trading for a Japanese one. This is not an item download but a download for the Pokemon itself.

As per usual you will need to have:
• Room for the wonder card (can’t have more than three)
• An English version of Diamond or Pearl and a DS
• Have obtained the Pokedex

Remember, you can only get one Shaymin per game chip. You can, however, trade the Shaymin to another game and restart your game thus allowing you to get as many Shaymin as you can want if you are willing to grind through the intro part of the game over and over again.

Originally posted by HMTKSteve from Poke Farm, on January 22, 2009 4:42 PM

over 170 code samples for eight APIs  

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Waxy.org Links, on January 22, 2009 4:26 PM

Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports notes that ‘according to major league sources’, free-agent pitcher Randy Wolf may soon sign with the Dodgers.

Wolf has been rumored to be part of the Mets’ contingency plan, should they fail to sign Oliver Perez.

…so if all the rumors are correct, and with the signing of garcia, it could soon be down to perez, sheets, and garland…oh, and some guy named pedro…

Originally posted by Regis Courtemanche from MetsBlog.com, on January 22, 2009 3:37 PM

What else is there to say?

Originally posted by Angela Tucker from tuckergurl, on January 22, 2009 3:14 PM

The poll results are in and they are... weird. I checked on the results from time to time over the past day and they started off with a quick lead for Yea, 24-12. Then this morning Nay started sloooowly creeping back, getting about a vote per hour. With an hour left, Nay had passed Yea 29-28. Then with just under an hour to go, Yea got two quick votes to jump ahead 30-29. Then the weirdness happened. I looked back with 20 minutes to go and Yea was up 33-31. I refreshed with under 10 minutes left and it was back to Yea 30-29. What? That's some serious Ken Blackwell mess going on right there. I closed the tab and opened it back up after the poll closed and it's back to 33-31. Then I opened another tab to check the comments on the original post and that poll says 30-29. Two tabs, same blog, same closed poll, two different results. I think Firefox is having cache amnesia. At any rate, the people have spoken, The SuperDelegate has made his decision and my Obama cards will be featured on the blog.

Now, I know Obama is not universally loved and some people are just not into politics and don't want it mixed in with their card fix. So, to make everyone happy and to try to keep the trolls from wandering in and whining about how this isn't what the blog is all about and they'll never come back ever blahblahblah this is what I'm gonna do for you:

Before every Big O post I am going to post a random card from the image vault:

And also post something wicked cool. In this case, a 13 year old girl playing Rush's YYZ on the drums. Warning: There's a big obnoxious flash ad full of bouncing mammaries on that page, but Rush played epically by a girl cancels out the blatant sexism. The 3000 hits that site just got because of that description... well I can't do anything about that sexism.

There, you got your dose of coolness. If you don't like Obama or don't care about his cards, please go away now.

Pack 1:

79 Economic Team Takes the Field

The striking thing about this card is that Topps was able to turn around an event from 11/24/08, Obama announcing his economic team, and have it ready on a card for release by 1/20/09. The design is very simple, but effective. No foil, no nonsense, just a full bleed photo with a small blue band at the bottom with the card name and red stars on either side. The back is well designed too:

A photo takeing up about a third of the card on the left, the title at top in a red stripe, a paragraph about the photo on the front and the card number and legalese on the bottom. Very well designed card for something that had to bave been slapped together really quickly. Imagine this design on the 2010 Topps base set? Hmmmm?

7 Loving, Nuturing Grandparents

This card makes me sad and I don't want to talk about it.

54 Bill Lends A Hand Inauguration Day foil stamp

This card is actually a parallel, although it's almost impossible to tell from the scan. In the bottom left corner above those three stars there is a gold foil stamp that says "Inauguration Day *2009*". I massively tweaked the scanner settings to get the best image I could of it.

It's a parallel. Not a particularly necessary one. They are one in three packs and for the purposes of my set, I just don't see that foil at all. Foil, what foil?

Sticker 17 of 18

Here's the one per pack sticker. It's die cut around the white border so you can just slap that part on your notebook. The backs are kind of cool:

Each back has an environmental tip and some history behind it. This back advocates cleaning up pollution and references Lady Bird Johnson's "Keep America Beautiful" campaign. Again, for a set that had to have had a really quick turnaround, this is very well designed.

81 The First Granny

I don't quite understand this photo. The card is supposed to be about Barack's mother in law, Marian, but it's got her out of focus looking at her daughter on the front of the card. There's a really nice picture of her on the back though, not sure why they didn't use that one.

12 The Newlyweds

Awwww ain't they cute.

3 From Hawaii to Washington

Here's Barack in full blown MIB bad ass mode. Why can't Topps get a picture of Derek Jeter or Jimmy Rollins as good as this one? Oh yeah, this was taken by a professional campaign photographer.

Up soon: Desert Storm pack. Then packs 2 and 3. I'm going to spread 'em out so you don't get Obama fatigue.

Originally posted by dayf from Cardboard Junkie, on January 22, 2009 3:07 PM

GovCom, known by their large collection of socially-driven data visualizations, has recently posted a series of info-political graphs highlighting the Palestinian Territorial Net [govcom.org] (i.e. the .ps domain name), and the political separations existing within it.

The graphs demonstrate how tthe majority of .ps sites is hosted outside of the Palestinian Territories, with over half of the providers located in the United States; and how of the top 100 videos referenced by Hamas and Fatah related sites, only 16 are referenced by both groupings.

An interesting reading is "The Politics of Web Space" (PDF) by Richard Rogers.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from information aesthetics, on January 22, 2009 2:59 PM

The Morton Umbrella Girl over the years. From Neatorama.

Did you know Chef Boyardee and Sara Lee were real people, but Betty Crocker and Aunt Jemima weren't? Neatorama covers the stories behind the logos of 10 famous food companies: Morton Salt, Heinz 57 Varieties, Jolly Green Giant, La Vache qui Rit (The Laughing Cow), Aunt Jemima, Betty Crocker, Chef Boyardee, Sara Lee, Quaker Oats, and Gerber Baby.

Originally posted by Robyn Lee from Serious Eats, on January 22, 2009 1:45 PM

Web/movie mashups. My favorites:

Harry Potterybarn.com
Il Huffington Postino
Slumdog Millionaire Dollar Homepage
Behind Enemy Bloglines
Schindler's Craigslist
Charlotte's WebCrawler
Freecreditreport.com Willy

And while not strictly adhering to the form, I also chuckled at "Bone Thugs & eHarmony". The best I could come up with for kottke.org is Girls Gone Wild: Kottke West, which is not so good.

Update: Duh, I totally forgot about Koyaaniskottke. Also: kottke.orgazmo, The Kottke Horror Picture Show, and Kottke Balboa. (thx, andy & charley)

Tags: movies remix www

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 22, 2009 1:31 PM

Yay, the Oscar nominations were announced! Which means that Waxy's annual survey of pirated Oscar-nominated films is here as well!

Out of 26 nominated films, an incredible 23 films are already available in DVD quality on nomination day, ripped either from the screeners or the retail DVDs. This is the highest percentage since I started tracking.

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 22, 2009 1:12 PM

On and On by Janet Jackson

It's literally a song about cruising down the road with the top down.

Dolphin by Prince

It's about reincarnating as a dolphin, which is what I do on the road.

Rock Star by N.E.R.D.

I remember when I first got this album, visiting my parents and going to pick up my then-girlfriend, now-wife at the airport so she could meet the folks for the first time, and being excited and a little nervous and just rocking out with this song blasting out of the windows of the rental car.

Originally posted by Anil from Anil Dash, on January 22, 2009 1:08 PM

Exciting news for us -- 35 boxes of TED archive tapes just arrived in
our New York office. We'll be digitizing this footage, re-watching it,
and turning it into TEDTalks. We're thrilled to be able to bring you
more talks from the legendary early days of TED.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from tedblog's posterous

Originally posted by (author unknown) from TED Blog, on January 22, 2009 12:43 PM

The Oscar nominees were announced this morning, which means it's time to get out your scorecards to see who's winning in the eternal struggle between the MPAA vs. the Internet. (Hint: It's not the MPAA.)

I've been tracking the distribution of Oscar-nominated films every year, culminating with the release of six years of piracy data last year. I've updated those spreadsheets with this year's 26 nominees, for a total of 211 films from the last seven years.

You can view or download all the data below, including a second sheet with some interesting aggregate stats. As always, I'll keep it updated until the Oscar broadcast.

Download: Excel (with formulas) or CSV
View: Google Spreadsheets

Findings

So, how did they do? Out of 26 nominated films, an incredible 23 films are already available in DVD quality on nomination day, ripped either from the screeners or the retail DVDs. This is the highest percentage since I started tracking.

Only three films are unavailable — Rachel Getting Married wasn't leaked online in any form, while Changeling is only available as a low-quality telecine transfer and Australia as a terrible quality camcorder recording.

Other findings:

• Academy members received screeners for at least 20 of the 26 films.


• 25 out of 26 films leaked in some form online, if you include camcorder recordings.


• The average time from the time screeners are received by Academy members to its leak online is 6 days.

Surprisingly, it seems like this year's Oscar movies took longer to leak online than in previous years. The chart below shows the median number of days from a movie's US release date to its first leak online.

Last year, one of the interesting findings was how the release of Region 5 DVDs were reducing the prestige of official screener leaks. This year, only four of the nominated films were released as R5s, compared to eight from last year. The numbers are still too small to tell if this is a trend, but it seems like the popularity of the R5 may have peaked in 2007. (Are the studios releasing fewer R5s in general?)

What other trends in the data am I missing? Feel free to chime in with your conclusions or visualizations in the comments.

Methodology

As usual, I included the feature films in every category except documentary and foreign films. I used Yahoo! Movies for US release dates, always using the first available date, even if it was a limited release. Cam, telesync, R5, and screener leak dates were almost universally taken from VCD Quality. I used the first leak date, with the exception of unviewable or incomplete nuked releases. Finally, the official screener dates came from Academy member Ken Rudolph, who lists the date he receives every screener on his personal homepage. Thanks again, Ken!

For previous years, see 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008 (part 1 and part 2).

 

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Waxy.org Links, on January 22, 2009 12:43 PM

We thought it was Sens. Barrosso (R) and Inhofe (R) holding up Obama's environment appointees. But now it seems like it's not them after all -- but rather some anonymous GOPer. We're not clear this is technically a 'hold'. But someone is anonymously preventing the nominations from moving forward. Perhaps you can help us smoke the person out.

Originally posted by Josh Marshall from Talking Points Memo, on January 22, 2009 11:38 AM

Another reader checks in from the inside:

I sit here quite jealous of the fresh breezes blowing at the other Executive Branch agencies. Our last "all hands" meeting was last Friday, at which former Commerce Secretary Don Evans told us in a repetitive, rambling, semi-coherent speech that George Bush was misunderstood, and an extraordinary man willing to do unpopular things that history would judge as right. That was followed by a significantly more eloquent retiring Secretary Gutierrez who told us what a privilege it had been to serve under a "giant" like Bush.

So, while others are feeling the love, we wait in limbo...

Originally posted by David Kurtz from Talking Points Memo, on January 22, 2009 11:18 AM

Today we announced our plans to do something more for the people who are responsible for Google's success — our employees. Recognizing that about 85% of our employees have at least some stock options that are underwater (i.e., have an exercise price higher than the current market price of our common stock), we plan to offer our employees the opportunity to exchange those options. Our goal is to continue to reward our employees for their contributions and do everything we can to keep them engaged and focused on serving our users.

Here's how the employee option exchange program would work:

• This will be a one-for-one, voluntary exchange. Employees will be able to exchange part or all of an existing option grant for the same number of new options.
• The offer period will begin on January 29, 2009 and end at 6:00 a.m. Pacific Time on March 3, 2009, unless Google is required or opts to extend the offer period.
• Based on this expected timeline, employees will be able to exchange their underwater options for new options with a strike price equal to the closing price of our stock on March 2, 2009.
• The new options will have a new vesting schedule that adds 12 months to the original vesting schedule. In addition, new options will vest no sooner than 6 months after the close of the offer period.
• Generally, all Googlers with options are eligible to participate (Eric Schmidt, Sergey Brin, and Larry Page do not hold options) except where precluded by legal and tax issues in certain countries. We are working to address these issues and the final offer documentation will specify any countries in which we are not able to offer the program.
• This option exchange program has been approved by our Board of Directors.

The number of Google shares subject to outstanding options will not change as a result of this employee-only option exchange. The total number of options expected to be exchanged in this program represents less than 3% of total shares currently outstanding.

We expect to take a modification charge estimated to be $460 million over the vesting periods of the new options. These vesting periods range from six months to approximately five years. This modification charge will be recorded as additional stock based compensation beginning in the first quarter of 2009. This estimate assumes an exchange price of approximately $300 per share and that all eligible underwater options will be exchanged under this program. As a result, this estimate is subject to change.

If you're interested in learning more about this employee-only stock option exchange, we encourage you to read our related SEC filings when they become available.

The option exchange described in this post has not launched. When the option exchange begins, Google will provide employees with written materials explaining the terms and timing. Eligible optionholders should read these materials carefully when they become available because they will contain important information about the option exchange. When the offer period begins, Google will file these materials with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as part of a tender offer statement. You will be able to obtain these written materials and other documents filed by Google with the SEC free of charge from the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. The $300 exchange price provided above is intended as an example only. We expect that the actual modification charge we take as a result of the option exchange will be determined based on the exercise price and number of options exchanged as well as the closing price of our stock on March 2, 2009, unless Google is required or opts to extend the offer period.

Posted by Laszlo Bock, VP, People Operations

Originally posted by A Googler from The Official Google Blog, on January 22, 2009 11:12 AM

I am posting this here so I'll have it handy to show Mr. Lacy every time he gets annoyed when I stop walking, talking or anything else and freeze into Blackberry mode. "But Obama does it!"

It's nice to have someone in the White House who you feel is living on the same planet, isn't it? (Also, sorry, but *swoon*)

Originally posted by sarah lacy from SarahLacy.com, on January 22, 2009 10:40 AM

The wait is (almost) over. At last, Lovely Day will re-open for business this Friday, Jan. 23, after being shut down for months due to fire damage that occurred back in October. Nolita's beloved eatery and hang-out spot will take delivery orders first before swinging into a full-scale operation. This is delicious news -- we've been craving their green curry, hobo noodles and grilled salmon with mashed sweet potatoes for too long! Welcome back, LD! Lovely Day, 106 Elizabeth St. (btw. Prince & Spring), (212) 925-3310 Photo by Sarah B. from Yelp

Originally posted by (author unknown) from PAPERMAG: WORD UP!, on January 22, 2009 10:14 AM

Last year a record number of tourists both foreign and domestic visited New York, which added up to a fair piece of change for the city's tax coffers as well as for the merchants, restaurants, hotels and cultural institutions that cater to them. Now with the cratering of the real estate and the financial sectors, tourism becomes the one remaining pillar of the economy. With foresight and forethought, the city went into action months ago with plans to better inform potential visitors before they get here and to better serve them once they arrive. The result is a new hi-tech touch-screen interactive center in Midtown, a refurbished and renamed website and marketing and advertising campaign designed to get the message across that New York City is still the world's number one tourist destination. The new website, nycgo.com, is one of the coolest city sites you'll ever see, not coincidentally because it had the good sense to team up with PAPERMAG.com as a content provider along with the New York Observer and Time Out New York. So it was with good cheer that I made it over to 810 Seventh Ave. where Mayor Mike -- as he was fondly referred to -- took to the podium, answered questions and tried out the high-tech bells, whistles and the nifty Google map integration which makes you feel like you're flying from Wall Street to Jackson Heights in a single bound. The Mayor informed us that marketing and advertising New York has become a priority. And that the city is expanding its footprint to 18 cities around the world as well as stepping up its presence in the mid west and California. While he believes that Obama administration will be sympathetic to the plight of cities, he's not waiting for them to build schools, repair bridges and rescue the city. For now, the city's decent credit rating makes it possible to continue improving the infrastructure while the new administration in Washington puts its plan together. The press conference concluded, the Mayor made his way around the center, chatting amiably while putting his theoretical tourist itinerary together and watching it come to life on the Google map that can be delivered to your mobile device. Though I wasn't in favor of him undoing the city charter so he could run again for Mayor, he does exude confidence even as the markets rumble.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from PAPERMAG: WORD UP!, on January 22, 2009 9:29 AM

Metsblog reader Mike Baron sent in his flickr slideshow which captures the current state of Shea Stadium, including the picture below.

Also, the guys at Baseball Fever have many disturbing images of the deconstruction process as well.

…again, as excited as i am to see citi field open up, it is just as disturbing to see a place that holds tons of memories for me, both good and bad, come crashing down…reminds me of when i finally sold my 1989 nissan sentra, complete with rust holes and no radio for $300…

Originally posted by Regis Courtemanche from MetsBlog.com, on January 22, 2009 9:15 AM

Nokia, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, reported Thursday a 69% drop in fourth-quarter profit as demand for its handsets fell sharply. The sales drop was particularly severe in China. Nokia also lost market share in the lucrative high-end segment.

Nokia also lowered its dividend, cut down its 2009 forecast of global demand for phones and said it would cut roughly 1,000 jobs to keep a lid on expenses.

Net profit in the three months to Dec. 31 fell to 576 million euros , or 0.15 euro a share, from 1.84 billion euros, or 0.47 euro a share, earned in the year-earlier quarter. This was well below 977 million euros that analysts had forecast.

Quarterly sales declined 19% to 12.66 billion euros, missing forecasts calling for a top line of 13 billion euros, as demand for phones dropped sharply.

The number of handsets shipped in the latest three months fell 15% to 113.1 million units. Sequentially, shipments slipped 4% - an unusual development considering the fourth quarter is customarily the strongest one for phone makers.

Among Nokia's individual divisions, the handset business suffered the most, with sales down 27% to 8.1 billion euros. The sharpest decline in the number of handsets shipped happened in China, which registered a 36% drop, followed by the Middle East and Africa, with a 23% fall.

Nokia estimated its market share at 37% in the quarter, down from 40% a year ago and 38% in the third quarter.

"In recent weeks, the macroeconomic environment has deteriorated rapidly, with even weaker consumer confidence, unprecedented currency volatility and credit tightness continuing to impact the mobile communications industry," said CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.

Nokia proposes to pay an annual dividend of 0.40 euro a share, down from 0.53 euro a share in 2007. It also said that the board has no current plans to buy back shares in 2009.

Nokia, however, is not alone as all handset producers suffer from major downshift in sales

Sony Ericsson posted its second straight quarterly loss last week and warned the market would deteriorate further in 2009.

Motorola said it would report a fourth-quarter loss and slash 4,000 jobs after its sales collapsed over the holiday season.

Originally posted by MobileMonday from MobileMonday News, on January 22, 2009 9:12 AM

Kevin Kelly has a thought-provoking piece on the long term trends of "renting" v. "owning" on Technium especially in the context of goods becoming more and more digital. This is the graf that particularly caught my attention, however...

As more items are invented and manufactured – while the total number of hours in a day to enjoy them remains fixed – we spend less and less time per item. In other words the long-term trend in our modern lives is that ALL goods and services will be short-term use. Therefore all goods and services are candidates for rental, sharing, and the social commons.

While time is fixed¹, the number of different ways that we can spend that time increase, which means that unless there is some natural floor on the span of attention, we'll be spending less and less time on each individual activity. "ALL goods and services will be short-term use" is a useful lens to think about our relationship with physical goods, esp. in the context of the three Rs of green that are drilled into the heads of every child -- reduce, reuse, recycle.

¹ Except on Lost, of course.

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 22, 2009 7:44 AM

fig. a: inside

We were pretty excited to receive our February 2009 issue of Food & Wine today. Kitchens? Love 'em. Comfort food? Who can argue with comfort food, right? We certainly can't. Winter? Yeah, we know a little about that. I mean, this is the view outside the window as I write:

fig. b: outside

(And you wonder why we're so fixated on comfort food?)

Now, we haven't had a chance to try out any of the recipes yet, but we also knew a little about the content of this month's issue.

fig. c: "Where to Go Next: Montreal"

You see, there's a short piece in there called "Where To Go Next: Montreal" which offers 11 tips on where to find some of Montreal's most tantalizingly tasty eats (including AEB's 2008 Restaurant of the Year, La Salle à Manger), and we can honestly say that we stand behind each and every suggestion.

Look for the issue at your nearest newsstand, or find it online here and here.

Oh, one more thing: if you want to wait until after the thaw to pay our fair city a visit, we fully understand, but those of us who live here know that much of Montreal's cuisine tastes all the better in the dead of winter. Seriously.

aj

Originally posted by aj kinik from ...an endless banquet, on January 22, 2009 5:53 AM

Please don't ask me why, but I'm obsessed with reading Gwyneth Paltrow's GOOP.

So I was extra tickled today when Gwyneth said she'd be sharing her and her friends' favorite books, and that friends list included Christy Turlington.

Christy's favorite reads include Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, and Pride and Prejudice.

Gwynnie's? Jane Eyre, Crime and Punishment and The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles, which she says "set [her] straight".

[Since this newest edition isn't on her site yet, feel free to click through if you're really curious about the favorite reads of Louis Vuitton's Spring 09 face. ]

So if you're ever stuck in an elevator with Christy, consider yourself armed for ice breaking.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Fashionista, on January 22, 2009 4:43 AM

Hillary just made a triumphant arrival at Foggy Bottom. Cheering State staffers crowd what I guess is the main lobby there, and she's making a short speech now. Looks like a campaign rally, such is the level of enthusiasm there for her.

Originally posted by David Kurtz from Talking Points Memo, on January 22, 2009 4:26 AM

May heaven blast the man that first invented hours, yes, and first set up a sundial here — and minced the day into mere nothings for me, curse it ! Why, when I was a boy my only sundial was my belly, and it was easily the best and most reliable timepiece of ‘em all. On its giving you notice, you’d eat, except when there was no food; now, even when there is it isn’t eaten, unless it suits old Sol. Why, we’ve reached the point where this town’s stuffed with sundials — while most of its citizens creep about all shrivelled up with emptiness.

--Plautus, Ancient Roman Playwright

Originally posted by jeb from Modcult, on January 22, 2009 2:16 AM

Originally posted by Liz from Lather Rinse Repeat, on January 22, 2009 12:21 AM

January 21, 2009 - 10:50 p.m. - Santa Monica, CA

We've received two gifts from Ryan McGinness in one month. We're def getting spoiled! Even the packaging was unique... the damn thing was silkscreened! This time, the postal service delivered us a copy of No Sin/No Future, Ryan's latest book, inscribed with a Sex Pistols quote. If you're a fan of Ryan's work, expect the usual -- lots of graphic imagery and intense personal input. Thanks again, Ryan!

From the publisher: The latest limited edition from Ryan McGinness - No Sin/No Future follows the trajectory of the artist's book Project Rainbow (2003, Gingko Press). A collection of snapshots, sketches, and scans, all extracted with a discerning eye from the artist's studio archives. Sketchbook notes collide with paintings-in-progress and combine with vectors and bitmaps to create a dense site-specific visual concoction that provides unprecedented insight into how this artist's mind works and the mental processes that deliver his unique style. The work of Ryan McGinness has exercised great influence in graphic design and visual art circles, and is collected by venerable institutions around the world including the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The edition is limited to 2500 copies.

168 Pages, 216 x 279 mm, Hardcover, 200 color Illustrations ISBN 978-1-58423-330-5

Originally posted by hustler of culture from hustler of culture, on January 21, 2009 8:50 PM

So is Caroline Kennedy in or out for Hillary Clinton's Senate seat?

Earlier tonight it was reported that Caroline Kennedy had withdrawn her bid to be appointed by Gov. David Paterson, first from the New York Post, then picked up again by the New York Times.

Then NBC News reported that a Kennedy family source told them that Caroline has not withdrawn -- that there was a "miscommunication" between herself and Gov. David Paterson's office. But they've since then revised their report to say she's really out.

And now check out this hilarious AP news alert, time stamped at 10:38 p.m. ET:

Source: Caroline Kennedy remains in contest to fill Hillary Clinton's NY Senate seat. (Corrects APNewsAlert with source saying Kennedy had withdrawn.)

Just when we thought she was out...she pulls herself back in.

Originally posted by Eric Kleefeld from TPM Election Central, on January 21, 2009 6:00 PM

Originally posted by Andrea from Andrea Harner, on January 21, 2009 11:44 AM

Michael Smethurst’s In Search of Cultural Identifiers post over at the BBC Radio Labs got me thinking about web identifiers for works, about LibraryThing and OCLC as linked library data providers, and finally about the International Standard Text Code. Admittedly it’s kind of a hodge-podge of topics, and I’m going to taking some liberties with what ‘linked data’ and ‘works’ mean, so bear with me.

Both OCLC Worldcat and LibraryThing mint URIs for bibliographic works, like these for Wide Sargasso Sea:

• http://www.librarything.com/work/27239
• http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/24630204

So the library community really does have web identifiers for works–or more precisely web identifiers for human readable records about works. What’s missing (IMHO) is the ability to use that identifier to get back something meaningful for a machine. Tools like Zotero need to scrape the screen to pull out the data points of interest to citation management. Sure, if you want you can implement COinS or unAPI to allow the metadata to be extracted, but could there be a more web-friendly way of doing this?

Consider how blog syndication works on the web. You visit a blog (like this one) and your browser is able to magically figure out the location of an RSS or Atom feed for the blog, and give you an option to subscribe to it.

Well it’s not really magic it’s just a bit of markup in the HTML:

<link rel="alternate" 
         type="application/rss+xml" 
         title="inkdroid RSS Feed" 
         href="http://inkdroid.org/journal/feed/" />

Simple right?

Now back to work identifiers. Consider that both Worldcat and LibraryThing have web2.0 apis for retrieving machine readable data for a work:

http://www.librarything.com/services/rest/1.0/?method=librarything.ck.getwork&id={work_id}&apikey={your_key}

or:

http://www.worldcat.org/webservices/catalog/content/{oclc_number}?wskey={key}

What if the web pages for these resources at OCLC and LibraryThing linked directly to these machine readable versions? For example if the page for Wide Sargasso Sea at LibraryThing contained this in its <head> element:

<link rel="alternate" 
         type="application/xml" 
         title="XML for Wide Sargasso Sea" 
         href="http://www.librarything.com/services/rest/1.0/?method=librarything.ck.getwork&id=27239&apikey=d231aa37c9b4f5d304a60a3d0ad1dad4" />

This would allow browsers, plugin tools like Zotero and web crawlers to follow the natural grain of the web and discover the machine readable representation. Admittedly this is something that COinS and unapi are designed to do. But the COinS and unAPI protocols are really optimized for making citation data, and non web identifiers available and routable via a resolver of some kind. Maybe I’m just over reaching a bit, but this approach of using the <link> header seems to embrace the notion that there are resources within the Worldcat and Librarything websites, and there can be alternate representations of those resources that can be discovered in a hypertext-driven way.

Of course there is the issue of the API key. In the example above I used the demo key in LibraryThing’s docs. More important in the context of web identifiers for works is the need to distinguish between the identifier for the record, and the identifier for the concept of the work, which is most elegantly solved (IMHO) by following a pattern from the Cool URIs for the Semantic Web doc. But I think it’s important that people realize that it’s not necessary to jump headlong into RDF to start leveraging some of the principles behind the Architecture of the World Wide Web. Henry Thompson has a nice web-centric discussion of this issue in his What’s a URI and Why Does it Matter?

While writing this blog post I noticed a thread over on Autocat that Bowker has been named the US Registrar for the International Standard Text Code. The gist is that the ISTC will be a “global identification system for textual works”, and that registrars (like Bowker) will mint identifiers for works, such as:

ISTC 0A9 2002 12B4A105 7

Where the structure of the identifier is roughly:

ISTC {registration agency} {year element} {work element} {check digit}

It’s interesting that the meat of the ISTC is the work element that is:

… assigned automatically by the central ISTC registration system after a metadata record has been submitted for registration and the system has verified that the record is unique;

The metadata record in question is actually a chunk of ONIX, which presumably Bowker will send to the ISTC central registrar, and get back a work id.

This work that the ISTC is taking on is really important–and one would imagine quite costly. One thing I would suggest to them is that they may want to make the ISTC codes have a URI equivalent like:

http://istc-international/0A9/2002/12B4A1057

They also should encourage Bowker and other registrars to publish their work identifiers on the web:

http://bowker.com/istc/0A9/2002/12B4A1057

It seems to me that we might (in the long term) be better served by a system that embraces the distributed nature of the web. A web in which organizations like Bowker, ISTC, OCLC, LibraryThing publish their work identifiers using URIs, and return meaningful metadata for them. Rather than waiting for other people to solve our problems, why don’t we start solving them ourselves bottom-up instead of waiting for someone else to solve it top-down?

Anyhow I feel like I’m kind of being messy in suggesting this linked-data-lite idea. Is it heresy? My alibi/excuse is that I’ve been sitting in the same room as dchud for extended periods of time.

Originally posted by ed from inkdroid, on January 21, 2009 11:06 AM

I want to point out one particular section of Obama's remarks this morning:

Going forward, anytime the American people want to know something that I or a former President wants to withhold, we will have to consult with the Attorney General and the White House Counsel, whose business it is to ensure compliance with the rule of law. Information will not be withheld just because I say so. It will be withheld because a separate authority believes my request is well grounded in the Constitution.

A reader writes in: "As you know, I work for the Department of Justice. That highlighted phrase has signaled a significant discussion around these parts."

It caught our eye, too. But it has me wondering about whether Obama can apply that retroactively to constrain now former President Bush.

Originally posted by David Kurtz from Talking Points Memo, on January 21, 2009 11:04 AM

-Photo by Getty Images-
I love me some Malia and Sasha Obama -- they are just the cutest things going. So I am so happy for them that, during their first night in the White House, the first daughters got a surprise they will never forget.

While their mom and dad were out shaking their things to Beyonce, the girls had some friends over to watch movies and partake in a White House scavenger hunt. So what did they find behind door No. 2? The Jonas Brothers!

Nick, Kevin and Joe surprised the girls and their friends by showing up at the end of the hunt. If Sasha and Maliat thought they were going to be popular before -- now kids are going to be begging to get an invite to their house. Ya never know who's going to show up.

Originally posted by Tracy Pepey from iVillage - Daily Blabber, on January 21, 2009 9:35 AM

Originally posted by (author unknown) from the real janelle, on January 21, 2009 9:19 AM

I haven't done this in about a month and some new blogs are piling up. A lazy Wednesday is a good day to knock this out.

Sully Baseball

I found this blog through a link on Baseball Musings a couple of weeks ago and it's becoming one of my favorites. It's more of a general baseball blog, but there are tons of cards all over it. Sully is currently in the middle of a series on all-time teams which is fantastic. We're also of a similar mind on many crucial issues of the day. Seriously, this is good. Check it out.

Walkoff Walk

A funny baseball blog I also stumbled upon because of Baseball Musings. Their BONILLA projection system is genius, and also shockingly accurate. Also: HOLYSHITIWANTHISCAP.

Baseball Musings

Ya know what, just click on that and find all these awesome baseball blogs for yourself.

The Sports Card File

A hundred other bloggers have linked to this blog already so I decided to wait a couple weeks and link it right when people were forgetting about it to maximize the effectiveness of my post. Yeah, that's the ticket. I didn't just put it off because I'm lazy! This is a blog about the baseball card industry from the inside. If you want to know the reasoning behind many of the desicions being made by Topps and Upper Deck nowadays (Like why the heck the UD screw up SP Legendary Cuts with a bunch of current players??) this is the place to go. Since people learn from failure, and knowledge comes from learning, it's safe to say that this could be the most knowledgeable blog on the internet. I mean, the guy created UD Documentary! Nuff said.

1972 Topps Blog

Another in a line of set-oriented card blogs. You people are not going to pull me into this, I swear. I am NOT starting another blog dedicated to a set. Nope, not gonna do it. I'll read yours though, I freakin' love this set. This blog has a lot of good writing and pop culture references in it too for all you nostalgia fans.

Seeds on the Dugout Floor

This one is all over the map which is awesome. For example: a slightly different Florida/Oklahoma matchup. I do have one quibble: this is not the original 44. THIS is the original 44.

Grand Cards

If you're going to collect a player, Curtis Granderson is a pretty dang good one to collect. And see? I'm not the only one who loves this set despite knowing for a fact that it's incredibly stupid.

OMGAutos

I know I've dropped the ball on Auto-Matic. If it weren't for my contributors, the blog wouldn't even exist anymore. I'll get my act together one of these decades. In the mean time this is another excellent autograph blog with some pretty nice schtuff in there.

Rain of Error

This isn't a card blog per se, but it does get into cards occasionally. It's a nifty change of pace though. He certainly has cool taste in music! You can't read about cards all the time... can you?

Zistle Blog

I'll admit, I'm not sure what this is. It looks like Zistle will eventually be a card database or something, but I unfortunately have not had time to check out the Beta. Let's just file this under coming soon...

Now, all the links that are pit to frint:

Mark the Date: 2/4/09 - Topps Series 1 live case break. I don't feel bad about not busting a box the day of release to show off anymore.

2009 Topps Heritage Checklist. and the 2008 timelines checklist

Something to top off your 2008 Allen & Ginter set. In related news: holy crap. That's a lotta people. In related related news: LOL and ROFL. Oh yeaaaaaah!

One more thing: it's not online yet, but if you are at the store, check out the magazine aisle and find this month's issue of Mad Magazine. Funniest cover in YEARS.

This is the issue of Baseball Cards Magazine that got me obsessed with the 1953 Topps set. I wish I knew what the heck I did with my copy.

One more reason why Mark Lemke is the best ever.

If you desperately want that Adam LaRoche jersey card with the red swatch, you better act quickly.

Oh dear Jesus, they're doing it in Europe now too...

Here's one for the comics fans: Superuseless Superpowers.

Ok, this article is extremely difficult to follow, but I think it basically says that all of space and time might be merely a holographic projection of the data encoded in the boundary of our 5 dimensional pringle-shaped universe. So if the universe is a hologram... then that means... UPPER DECK IS GOD. All glory to 1996 SPX!

Originally posted by dayf from Cardboard Junkie, on January 21, 2009 8:50 AM

Obama: "Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency."

Originally posted by Josh Marshall from Talking Points Memo, on January 21, 2009 8:24 AM

Yesterday was a historic day. On January 20th, 2009, Barack H. Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States of America - the first African-American ever to hold the office of U.S. Commander-in-Chief. The event was witnessed by well over one million attendees in chilly Washington D.C., and by many millions more through coverage on television and the Internet. Collected here are photographs of the event, the participants, and some of the witnesses around the world. (48 photos total)

The Capitol is illuminated in the early morning hours before the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States of America January 20, 2009 in Washington, DC. (David McNew/Getty Images)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from The Big Picture, on January 21, 2009 7:29 AM

Today's must-read: Isaac Spaceman over at Throwing Things offers up a hilarious recap of everything that's happened on the previous four seasons of "Lost." If you prefer your recaps both shorter and infinitely less entertaining, after the jump is the...

Originally posted by Alan Sepinwall/The Star-Ledger from NJ.com: Ent. TV & Film - Impact: Alan Sepinwall, on January 21, 2009 6:41 AM

There are differing views on how to revive Play-Doh that has been left out of the canister overnight. First, the DIY version:

Using a kitchen or bathroom sink, rinse the Play Doh for 10-15 seconds. Knead the dough for 30 seconds...

And then there's the corporate version:

If the PLAY-DOH compound has started to dry out or if the colors have become messy and mixed, remember: PLAY-DOH compound is inexpensive and easy to buy. Nothing beats a fresh can!

When in doubt, shop!

Tags: playdoh howto

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 21, 2009 6:24 AM

Posted by Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of New York City

[From time to time we invite guests to blog about initiatives of interest, and are very pleased to have Mayor Bloomberg join us here. – Ed.]

This is New York City: the ultimate destination and home to world-class hotels, dining, shopping, arts, entertainment and more.

In partnership with Google, we are launching a new website and Information Center to help make it easier for both visitors and residents to explore all the energy, excitement and diversity of New York City's five boroughs. nycgo.com is the official resource on the web for all there is to see, do and experience in the City. This dynamic site uses Google Maps to help you plan your New York experience and find hotels, restaurants and entertainment, in addition to exclusive citywide savings and promotions. With nycgo.com you can use Google Maps to get directions to attractions throughout the City, and even send the info to your phone with Google Maps for mobile.

While you're in New York, stop by the brand new Official New York City Information Center at 810 Seventh Avenue, between 52nd and 53rd Streets. The Information Center features interactive map tables, powered by the Google Maps API for Flash, that let you navigate venues and attractions as well as create personalized itineraries, which can be printed, emailed or sent to mobile devices. Additionally, there's a gigantic video wall that utilizes Google Earth to display a 3D model of New York City on which you can map out personalized itineraries.

So whether you are a visitor or a resident, we invite you to explore New York City from your home computer, your mobile phone—and of course, in person.

Get started by taking a look at this video:

Originally posted by A Googler from The Official Google Blog, on January 21, 2009 5:47 AM

image from The Times A new paper house has been developed that can be used for people in disaster areas, the urban poor and refugees. The Swiss inventor says that the "the number of migrants, refugees living in improvised housing, is going to grow with climate change, and we offer an alternative.” His house is a response to the shanty-town sheds with corrugated roofs, often seen in third world countries. It is pre-fab, light (weighs 1,746 lb.), waterproof and easily assembled. And it's cheap, made out of resin-soaked cellulose from recycled cardboard and newspapers, it costs $5,000 per house. ...

Originally from TreeHugger, ReBlogged by andreapolli on Jan 21, 2009 at 09:44 AM

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Eyebeam reBlog, on January 21, 2009 4:44 AM

By Mark Malazarte

Originally posted by teie from Toxico Cultura, ReBlogged by andreapolli on Jan 21, 2009 at 09:44 AM

Originally posted by teie from Eyebeam reBlog, on January 21, 2009 4:44 AM

…hat tip to Long Island Met Fan for the following story…

In an on-air report for KEYC-TV in Minnesota, Jennifer Hudspeth talks with the guys from Uni-Systems and Fiberglas Fabricators about building the new Home Run Apple for Citi Field.

According to the report, the new Apple is four-times bigger than the old Apple, and it weighs 6,000 pounds. 

To watch Hudspeth’s segment, which features footage of the new Apple, click play below:

 

Originally posted by Matthew Cerrone from MetsBlog.com, on January 21, 2009 4:40 AM

There was no way I wasn't going to love this dress. First of all, I love that color. Secondly, I love Isabel Toledo. (I actually met her -- and her fantastic husband -- once. She's even better in person.) Then, when you add in that she is wearing all that as THE FIRST LADY, well, you can see how one might become a bit overwhelmed.

And then those fantastic gloves! Swoon. [Disclosure: I have a vintage pair in just that color.]

I read a couple of pages of people's comments on this on the NYT caucus blog, and was disappointed that no one seemed to realize that Michelle Obama does what I advocate everyone should do: she wears what makes her happy. Could she have worn some boring royal-blue, be-Spanx-ed sheath, by Oscar de la Renta (no offense, Oscar, but you know what I'm talking about) and gotten relieved and approving nods from the Fashion Commentariat? You know she could. But she obviously loves those gloves: they made her happy, so she wore them. WITH a yellow wool lace Isabel Toledo!

The thing is, you can't please everyone all of the time. You can't even please most of the people most of the time. Which is why, especially when it comes to clothes, you have to please yourself. You're the one wearing them; you're the one in the pictures; you're the only one whose happiness is even remotely under your own control: so do what feels right!



I like this one too, even though it's not my taste. (In other words, I don't have a tulle-laden Jason Wu in my closet next to my green gloves.) I do think it looked great. But even if I didn't, I'd see that Michelle Obama is accessorizing it with the only things that really matter: confidence, happiness, and the kind of ease that comes from having made one's own decisions.

And that, my friends, is something that I hope the new First Lady brings firmly into fashion.

Originally posted by Erin from A Dress A Day, on January 21, 2009 4:39 AM

The Mets reached agreement yesterday on new one-year contracts with Ryan Church and Angel Pagan, thus avoiding arbitration.

The day before, Duaner Sanchez and Jeremy Reed signed one-year deals with the team, also avoiding arbitration.

Church will earn $2.8 million, up $800,00 from last season.  He is eligible for arbitration through 2011, after which he can become a free agent.

Meanwhile, John Maine and Pedro Feliciano are still in negotiations.

Maine is seeking $3 million for 2009, while the team is offering $2.2 million.

Like Church, he is eligible for arbitration this season, 2010 and 2011, after which he can become a free agent.

To check out other arbitration figures, such as Ryan Howard’s request for $18 million, go to MLB Trade Rumors.

Lastly, to learn about how the arbitration process works, read Padres Ass’t GM Paul DePodesta’s blog, It Might be Dangerous.

Originally posted by Matthew Cerrone from MetsBlog.com, on January 21, 2009 3:44 AM

Originally posted by (author unknown) from the real janelle, on January 21, 2009 3:41 AM

Some great folks in Baltimore (Red Emmas, Indypendent Reader) and around the country are planning an exciting conference for March 27-29 called City from Below. If you are all interested in urbanism, public space, who controls cities, the right to city, and the future of urban activism, you might want to hitch a ride to Baltimore at the end of March! Check it out here.

Originally posted by Josh M. from Just Seeds: Blog, on January 21, 2009 3:03 AM

-Photo by Getty Images-

Here it is!

People have been buzzing for months about what Michelle Obama was going to wear to her husband's inaugural ball, -- and voila! -- the new first lady went with winter white.

A one-shouldered Jason Wu gown, to be exact. One that the Wall Street Journal says sells for $3000-$6000.

So, did you love it? I think she looks simply regal.

Originally posted by Tracy Pepey from iVillage - Daily Blabber, on January 21, 2009 12:44 AM

It is with great pride and not a little physical exhaustion that we announce the completion of the 14th-annual Baseball Prospectus guide to the coming season. In addition to the usual incisive essays, player comments, and PECOTA projections for all 30 teams and more players than you can easily name without having a couple of stiff drinks before making the attempt, Baseball Prospectus 2009 features:

• A new mix of statistics, including WARP for batters, Defense-Adjusted ERA for pitchers.

• Clay Davenport’s dramatically revised fielding runs.

• David Laurila’s “Discovering America,” a look at Latinos adjusting to life in the American pros.

• BP Professor Emeritus Gary Huckabay’s look at MLB marketing.

• Neil deMause’s review of the latest stadium shenanigans.

• A new installment of Kevin Goldstein’s Top 100 prospects.

• PECOTA leaderboards.

• A new foreword by Keith Olbermann

And of course as always, the book contains a War and Peace-Moby Dick smashup’s-worth of the trenchant commentary, humor, and insight from the BP crew that has made the annual stand out from the many disposable fantasy products that come out at this time of year.

BP 2009 is already rolling off the presses as we speak, and will be arriving in stores and at your favorite on-line vendor just after Valentine’s Day. As in previous years, the BP gang will soon after be hitting the road to talk up the new baseball season, sign books, and perform amazing feats of prediction (in some cases while dodging traffic). Watch BP Unfiltered and our Events page for more information in the coming days. On behalf of my co-editor, Christina Kahrl, the assembled BP authors, and myself, I thank you for your continued patronage of our book, very much hope that you enjoy the results of our labors, and look forward to meeting you and talking baseball at a bookstore near you.

Originally posted by Steven Goldman from Baseball Prospectus: Unfiltered, on January 20, 2009 11:26 PM

a similar dip happened on Flickr and Last.fm, but Twitter exploded during his oath  

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Waxy.org Links, on January 20, 2009 11:03 PM

Social Media "Experts" are the Cancer of Twitter (and Must Be Stopped). "The zombies then seek each other: You'll always notice that of the 5,000 followers that a social media expert has that all 5,000 of them are also social media 'experts'. Their only form of conversation is to quote each other and live tweet conferences where they gather."

Originally posted by rex@fimoculous.com (Rex Sorgatz) from Fimoculous.com, on January 20, 2009 8:00 PM

I love this...Barack Obama has been asking John McCain for his advice over the past few weeks.

Over the last three months, Mr. Obama has quietly consulted Mr. McCain about many of the new administration's potential nominees to top national security jobs and about other issues -- in one case relaying back a contender's answers to questions Mr. McCain had suggested.

McCain, though it was his own fault (or that of his handlers), didn't represent himself well during the presidential campaign and it's nice to see that the very able Senator isn't being sidelined because of it. Also, it's quite savvy of Obama to seek out his support. He's essentially buying McCain stock at a low point and will presumably leverage that purchase when that stock inevitably rises.

Tags: johnmccain barackobama politics

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 20, 2009 3:50 PM

EPIC FU - obama mania!

Originally posted by (author unknown) from shey.net, on January 20, 2009 2:40 PM

Examiner column for January 21.

    Barack Obama is not just the first black man to become President, he is the most literary writer to become President. Other Presidents have written books, usually after leaving office and even then with the help of a “real writer” to shape the narrative and smooth out wrinkles in the prose. But Obama became a writer before he ever became a politician--way back when he was in law school.

    Obama exhibits the habits of a writer. He keeps a notebook; he keeps a journal. He files away memorable events and hopes they will become anecdotes to illustrate a point in an argument, or represent a moment in time. As a writing teacher, one of my greatest pleasures is watching my students undergo this transformative process.

    “I’ve thought of writing about my grandmother, but never before had a reason to,” Aaron told me last semester. What he wrote will now become a part of his family history. We all have stories to tell and simply need to be bitten by the writing bug to realize the potential power our words have over others and over our perception of ourselves.

    Obama is now an important model for writing students. In the introduction to  “Dreams from My Father,” he tells us that his autobiography started out as a group of essays about race, using personal anecdote as illustration. Like Obama, students often begin to write one way and grow into something different.

    High school seniors usually begin their college essays by “telling” the college what they think they want to hear. They enumerate accomplishments in hackneyed prose, devoid of the singular “voice” that will set their dreams apart from everyone else’s.

    Like Obama, students rewrite, forcing themselves to “show” rather than “tell,” developing voice and humor in the process. Obama began his first book with a “list of topics” tracing an “intellectual journey,” and ended with “a record of a personal, interior journey—a boy’s search for his father, and through that search a workable meaning for his life as a black American.”

    That journey encapsulates the power of personal narrative, a power I’ve seen played out continually in my classrooms. But for the first time now we have a President whose writing process helped him to understand himself and his place in society.

    Will having a writer as President make a difference in writing classrooms? I think it will. At a speech last summer given at a local high school, Obama was asked about his views of the National Writing Project and the role writing could play in students’ lives. He responded by praising his writing experience as a process through which he was able to come to terms with uncomfortable realities in his own past, a process invaluable to his growth. His example might make classroom writing “hip.”

    Writing is not a path to self-congratulation, but a way to recognize truths, no matter how painful. As Aaron, Kate, and other students have discovered, those truths are empowering as well as humbling. We all admire Obama’s combination of humility and confidence, in words and actions. Those are the lessons of a writer, one who now resides in the White House—and maybe even in your own home.

Originally posted by Erica Jacobs from TeacherTalk, on January 20, 2009 1:45 PM

Drew Friedman’s Obama portrait for The New Yorker, entitled “The First.” See also “Greatness” by Nicholas Lemann.

(via austinkleon and Boing Boing.)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from shey.net, on January 20, 2009 9:51 AM

Very brief spoilers about last night's "24" -- including my explanation for why this'll be the last time I write about the show for anytime soon -- coming right up......

Originally posted by Alan Sepinwall/The Star-Ledger from NJ.com: Ent. TV & Film - Impact: Alan Sepinwall, on January 20, 2009 8:51 AM

Obama made a small error in the first part of his inaugural speech. He said:

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath.

Because of Grover Cleveland's two non-consecutive terms, there have been 44 Presidents but only 43 people have held the office and taken the oath. I'm surprised his speechwriters didn't catch that little detail. Of course, I think of Al Gore as an ex-President so maybe that's where it came from.

Tags: barackobama politics usa

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 20, 2009 8:38 AM

The Mets and OF Cory Sullivan agreed to a one-year, $600,000 contract, which includes $300,000 in incentives, according to the Denver Post.

The 29–year-old Sullivan, who bats left-handed, is a career .279 hitter, with a .330 OBP and just eight HR in 927 at bats for the Rockies, during which he hit .269 away from Colorado.

He has played right field, center in left during his career.

The Padres, Rangers, Marlins and D’Backs had all been linked in rumor to Sullivan during the off-season.

Originally posted by Matthew Cerrone from MetsBlog.com, on January 20, 2009 8:21 AM

A stunning moment, a great speech. I don't think any single line will enter the lexicon like Kennedy's "ask not" or FDR's "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Obama's "age of responsibility" seemed flat, forgettable. But the moments that punctuated it like the call for the end of "childish things" gave it a momentum that made it greater than the sum of its parts.

There was a liberal, JFK hawkishness about the speech that I found compelling. There was the martial memory of Valley Forge, but also "we will defeat you" and we "will not apologize for our way of life." There was the expected outstretched hand to the Muslim world--made all the more powerful by the once verboten word Hussein echoing across the Mall. But the stern words about terrorism were more extensive and explicit and impressive than I would have expected. I loved his challenge "to those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West"--the West, there's a phrase you don't hear a lot anymore. It was a shot at the like of Hugo Chavez. He used the word "war" and promised our enemies "defeat." The explicit defense of the market and capitalism was unexpected and refreshing. Kind of wish he'd mentioned Fallujah along with Normandy and Khe Sahn. (If you think Iraq and Vietnam were the wrong wars, then Fallujah belongs in that line as much as Khe Sahn, since he was discussing service not policy.)

The linkages with the past, the "for us", rhetorical device gave it the historical lift. Has the word "swill" ever been used in an inaugural?

That said, I thought the dis of Bush-era interrogation measures and civil liberties shortcuts was also stronger and more explicit than I would have thought. It was a pretty bald shot at his predecessor.

And the Joe Lowery's finish, humorous and poignant, was a incredible finish, far better than having, say, Obama invoking King by name. If there's any better living witness to the King years, it's hard to think of one. Mercifully, the phrase "yes, we can"--powerful but now hammered to death--was left in the campaign file.

By the way, on the oath flub, someone who works with Roberts told me that he had practiced the oath extensively. It seemed to me that Roberts flubbed and not Obama, but I'll leave that to the replays.

Originally posted by Matthew Cooper from TPM Election Central, on January 20, 2009 8:14 AM

Yesterday, the Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic said free-agent LHP Randy Wolf rejected a contract offer from the D’Backs.

Last week, Piecoro said free-agent RHP Jon Garland also rejected a contract offer from the D’Backs.

According to Piecoro, “The Diamondbacks are believed to have about $4 million left to spend for 2009,” and offered a one-year deal to Garland with two option years.

…so, like i said before, it’s now safe to assume garland and wolf are not interested in at least a one-year, $4 million deal… from what i can gather, garland has been on Omar Minaya’s radar, but i have no idea to what extent he is willing to pay… i do believe the Mets like wolf, but they’re unwilling to spend more than $6 million or so on on him… the buzz from around baseball suggests wolf is still seeking a long-term deal worth roughly $10 million per season…

…earlier in the off-season, garland had been looking for a two– or three-year deal, worth around $10 million per season, though i am not sure he can expect to get that today…

According to multiple reports, the D’Backs have interest in free-agent RHP Pedro Martinez, as well, though he would prefer to remain on the East Coast.

Speaking of pitchers…

The Daily Herald believes free-agent RHP Freddy Garcia will sign a contract by the end of this week, and has narrowed his decision down to the Mets, White Sox and Rangers.

Last week, however, the same newspaper said the White Sox were not inclined to sign Garcia, because they recently acquired Bartolo Colon.

Originally posted by Matthew Cerrone from MetsBlog.com, on January 20, 2009 6:21 AM

zaha hadid architects has won the competition for the new port house - headquarters of the antwerp port authority (APA), antwerp, belgium. located on the boundary between the city of antwerp and its harbour, the new headquarters will solve the pressing shortage of workspace in the present port house on the entrepot quay. some 500 people will be able to move into the new building when it is completed in 2013. the estimated construction cost is 31.5 million euros excluding VAT and architect’s fees. this includes all the work for an office building with around 12,000 m2 of floor space, together with underground parking for ca. 300 cars.



the new port house design consists of two entities: the existing fire station and a new crystalline volume lifted above the retained building. together they form a new landmark as the headquarters of the antwerp port authority, overlooking the city and port.



'I am absolutely delighted to be selected to build the headquarters for the APA. antwerp is one of the world’s busiest shipping ports and the new port house design reflects the city’s worldwide significance in communication and transportation. the dichotomy between the reflective, faceted form of the new extension and the powerful structural mass of the existing fire station creates a bold and enigmatic statement for the city.' zaha hadid



'the concept is a free interpretation of a beam-shaped volume raised above the existing fire brigade building and supported on three sculptured concrete pillars housing the stairs and lifts. two of the pillars are situated on the covered inner courtyard of the firehouse, while the third is located beside an external support point and consists of a panoramic lift shaft.'



'the head of the building on the south side is a frame that looks towards the city and clearly marks the start of the port area. the outside walls are made up of glass triangles, some transparent and some reflecting. these do not all lie in the same plane but are rotated slightly with respect to one another, creating a reflecting play of incoming light in a reference to antwerp’s diamond industry.'



'the inner courtyard will be roofed over at the height of the second story so as to create an enclosed interior space. this central entrance hall will be considered as a semi-public space, with various enquiry desks integrated in the inside wall portals. a sculptural, sloping roof unites an underground lobby with the covered inner court. access to the underground car park is an important aspect of the overall concept, with the loading & unloading bays and the refuse handling facilities also located here.' zaha hadid architects

more
zaha hadid architects: http://www.zaha-hadid.com
port of antwerp: http://www.portofantwerp.com

designboom interview


zaha hadid (2006)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Designboom - Weblog, on January 20, 2009 6:11 AM

The provisional rosters were announced yesterday for the World Baseball Classic, and 14 players from the Mets organization are scheduled to take part, including:

David Wright, J.J. Putz and Brian Schneider (USA); Francisco Rodriguez and Johan Santana (Venezuela); Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, Pedro Feliciano and Jesus Feliciano (Puerto Rico); Ruben Tejada and Angel Cuan (Panama); Jose Reyes (Dominican Republic); Shawn Bowman (Canada); and Stefan Welch (Australia).

…i’m sorry, MLB, but i just can’t get excited about this tournament… instead, i just worry about injuries… i get it, i understand it’s importance, in terms of international fans, etc., but i prefer the Bobby Valentine Method, which would be to have the MLB champion, i.e., the Phillies, play other league champions, in an off-season tournament, not long after our World Series… but, this spring training thing is just a nightmare on so many levels, i feel…

Santana is listed on the Venezuelan roster, however whether or not he participates will be determined by his progress in spring training.

By the way, free-agent Oliver Perez is scheduled to play for Mexico.

Originally posted by Matthew Cerrone from MetsBlog.com, on January 20, 2009 4:55 AM

In honor of today’s inauguration of a new American president, here are a few “presidential” facts about El Presidente, Dennis Martinez:

Most PAs against Martinez:

                   **PA**  AB  H  2B 3B HR RBI  BB  SO   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS   SH  SF IBB HBP GDP G_miss YR_miss
+-----------------+-------+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---+---+---+---+---+------+-------+
 Barry Bonds         100    92  21  5  1  1   7   8   8  .228  .290  .337  .627   0   0   2   0   0

None other than Barry “U.S.” Bonds.

Most HR against Martinez:

                    PA  AB  H  2B 3B **HR** RBI  BB  SO   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS   SH  SF IBB HBP GDP G_miss YR_miss
+-----------------+---+---+---+--+--+------+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---+---+---+---+---+------+-------+
 Jim Rice           95  85  32  4  4    7    26   7   8  .376  .421  .765 1.186   0   2   0   1   2

None other than outgoing Secretary of State Jim “Condoleeza” Rice.

He gave up a homer to Randy “George” Bush:

  Car# Year Date          Tm   Opp Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit Play Desc.
+-----+----+-------------+---+----+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+-------------------------+
     1 1983 1983-05-25    MIN @BAL ahead  2-0  t 1 12-   1  -      Flyball: CF (Deep CF)

  Car# Year Date          Tm   Opp Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit Play Desc.
+-----+----+-------------+---+----+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+-------------------------+
     2 1984 1984-07-04    MIN  BAL tied   0-0  b 2 ---   0  -      Strikeout
     3                             down   1-3  b 4 ---   1  -      Groundout: 2B-1B
     4                             down   1-5  b 7 ---   0  -      Home Run

  Car# Year Date          Tm   Opp Score       Inn RoB Out Cnt Pit Play Desc.
+-----+----+-------------+---+----+-----------+---+---+---+---+---+-------------------------+
     5 1985 1985-07-09    MIN @BAL tied   0-0  t 1 ---   2  -      Ground-rule Double
     6                             ahead  1-0  t 3 12-   1  -      Walk; Puckett to 3B; Hatcher to 2B
     7                             ahead  4-0  t 4 1-3   2  -      Lineout: 1B            

And so on…

Originally posted by Andy from Stat of the Day, on January 20, 2009 3:12 AM

Curse of the Sciatic Nerve

This past several days I've had very similar habits to a vampire. Sleeping all day. Up at night. Sporting an ashen, almost chalky complexion. Of course, all these new habits were the result of throwing out my back, rather than mythic immortal androgyny. And while the live-wire buzz of a pinched nerve is no picnic, the real downside has been that it's nearly impossible to draw while I lay on my back. But luckily I'm able to stand again, so I can only assume the rest of my life will soon return to normal — which is good because I can't keep drinking all this blood. It's staining my crowns.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Bearskinrug Articles, on January 20, 2009 12:35 AM

"Lost" co-creator Damond Lindelof, right, with producing partner Carlton Cuse.In this interview with "Lost" co-creator Damon Lindelof, we look back on some of the behind-the-scenes decisions for season four, why some fans may be troubled by season five's emphasis on...

Originally posted by Alan Sepinwall/The Star-Ledger from NJ.com: Ent. TV & Film - Impact: Alan Sepinwall, on January 20, 2009 12:30 AM

How do you feel about time travel, "Lost" fans? Sure, the dazzling island adventure has dabbled in four dimensions in the past, with the flashes and journeys of consciousness of Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick). But as the series' fifth (and...

Originally posted by Alan Sepinwall/The Star-Ledger from NJ.com: Ent. TV & Film - Impact: Alan Sepinwall, on January 20, 2009 12:30 AM

'globus' by michiel van der kley

netherlands furniture designer michiel van der kley has created
a mobile work station called 'globus'. the piece has two different
guises in shape. in its closed form, it hides its function and evokes
curiosity. in its open form, the work station is a multi-functional,
all-in-one work station with a work-top and a swivel chair.
the piece is constructed with a cast aluminum base on wheels,
supporting a moulded plastic globe with two sections.

more:
www.michielvanderkley.nl

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Designboom - Weblog, on January 19, 2009 10:49 PM

"Ok hi, heh, ok heh. My name is b0xxy. Most of you know me as um oom ugh um most of you know me as b0xxy. I suppose if you're watching this you probably know me as b0xxy, but um ugh ugh most of you don't know me as moldy lunchbox..."

Andy Baio transcribes this b0xxy video in the comment thread of this post by Rex Sorgatz. At least, it looks like Andy did it; maybe he outsourced it to Mechanical Turk? (More b0xxy context, which I'm sure is exactly what you're looking for on inauguration eve.)

Update: Andy points out in the comments that he pulled the transcription from Encyclopedia Dramatica. Which, you know, is sorta like Mechanical Turk.

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 19, 2009 8:37 PM

I was wondering why Kottke looked the way it did¹, all Helvetica'd up; I thought Jason would be a bit more original than that. Then I viewed source and quickly wrote up a whole post in my head about how his font-family declaration is specifying Hoefler & Frere-Jones' Whitney² as the default font.  My shocking post title was going to be something along the lines of "It'll cost you $499 to read Kottke the way God intended." But then he went and posted all about it himself, scooping me on scooping him, the bastard.

¹ For the record, I like the blue border, and the descriptive header, and the site when rendered in Whitney or Myriad.

² And here's the conspiracy theory / hater shiv between the ribs, just for kicks. Jason's blogged an awful lot about Hoefler & Frere-Jones over the years; do you think he paid for Whitney? Or could this be a way for Hoefler or Frere-Jones to make their way about town saying "Hey, bring up Kottke.org, wouldja? I need to check something..." and then shouting "Hey! Did you pay for Whitney???"

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 19, 2009 7:35 PM

Jason Scott: "So what, then? What is really of meaning to you? Your twitters? Your weblog entries? Your list of bookmarks? Your photos? What? Because if you're not asking what stuff means anything to you, then you're a sucker, ready to throw your stuff down at the nearest gaping hole that proclaims it is a free service (or ad-supported service), quietly flinging you past an End User License Agreement that indicates that, at the end of the day, you might as well as dragged all this stuff to the trash. If it goes, it's gone."

Originally posted by Michal Migurski from tecznotes links, on January 19, 2009 6:21 PM

The design of kottke.org has been mostly the same since 2000...a garish yellow/green bar across the top and small black text on a white background everywhere else. (See the progression of designs since 1998.) People absolutely hated that color when I first introduced it¹, but it stuck around -- mostly out of laziness -- and that pukey yellow became the most visible brand element of the site.

Two days ago, I refreshed the design of the site and, as you may have noticed, no more yellow/green. The other big changes are: bigger text set in a new font, a blue "zoom" border around the page, and the addition of titles to the short posts.

(A brief nuts and bolts interlude... For most of you, the site will look like this. If you've got Myriad Pro on your machine -- it comes free with Acrobat Reader and Adobe CS -- it'll look like this...this is the "intended" look. And if you're a fancypants designer with Whitney installed, you'll get this rarified view, which I did mostly for me. On IE6, the site will be legible and usable but somewhat unstyled. If you're not seeing something that looks like one of the above screenshots -- if the text is in all caps, for instance -- please drop me a line with a link to a screenshot and your browser information. Thanks!)

The blue "zoom" border is the biggest visual change, and it's an homage to what is still my favorite kottke.org design, the yellow zoom from 1999. I like that kottke.org is one of the few weblogs out there that can reach back almost ten years for a past design element; the site has history. In a way, that border is saying "kottke.org has been around for ten years and it's gonna be around for twenty more". At least that's how I think about it.

I've already gotten lots of feedback from readers, mostly via Twitter and email. There were a few technical issues that I've hopefully ironed out -- e.g. it should work better on the iPhone now -- and a couple which might take a bit longer, like the border messing with the page-at-a-time scrolling method. Some people like the changes, but mostly people don't like the new design, really dislike the blue, and generally want the old site back. This is exactly the reaction I expected, and it's heartening to learn that the old design struck such a chord with people. All I'm asking is that you give it a little time.

My suspicion is that as you get used to it, the new text size won't seem so weird and that blue border will likely disappear into the background of your attention, just as that hideous yellow/green did. A month from now, your conscious mind won't even see the blue -- chalk it up to something akin to banner blindness...brand blindness maybe? -- but your subconscious will register it and you'll just know where you are, safe and sound right here at good ol' kottke.org. And if that doesn't work, we'll tweak and move some things around. Design is a process, not a result, and we'll get it to a good place eventually, even if it takes twenty years.

[1] I wish I had access to my email from back then...everyone hated it and wanted the old design back. Before landing on the yellow/green color, I tried the golden yellow from the previous design, a blue very much like the blue in the current border, and then red. I think each color was live on the site for a few days and my intention was to just keep switching it around. But then I got bored and just left the yellow/green. Gold star to anyone who remembers that short phase of the site. ↩

Tags: design www webdev kottkedotorg

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 19, 2009 4:31 PM

Run-DC (via xeni)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from shey.net, on January 19, 2009 2:01 PM

Chances are that if you're not in Washington DC or staying home from work tomorrow, you're going to be at your desk or otherwise out and about for the inauguration of Barack Obama. Fear not, you'll have plenty of viewing options:

Official Presidential Inaugural site
Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies site
C-SPAN
Hulu
The networks: NBC, ABC, CBS.

Or watch right here on kottke.org, courtesy of Hulu:

Per the schedule, the swearing-in ceremony will start at 11:30 am ET, which will include Obama's inaugural address. After the address, Obama "will escort outgoing President George W. Bush to a departure ceremony", which ceremony I hope involves a kick in the ass and a slamming door. Then there's a luncheon at the Capitol and a parade to the White House that traditionally starts around 2:30 pm.

Tags: barackobama politics

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 19, 2009 11:55 AM

Quick Post

A man retells his attempt at finding the origin of a favorite family recipe in explicit detail. This is the kind of detective work I enjoy. I'm sure they'll be a CSI spinoff of this nature soon.

http://justinsomnia.org/2009/01/melt-in-the-mouth-cookies-a-brief-history/

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Capn Design, on January 19, 2009 11:05 AM

We're always proud of the work done by our experts at Six Apart Services, but it's especially gratifying when we personally benefit from the work we do with our clients. For example, we've been friends with the Gothamist team since they started, and have marveled over the years as they've grown into the most established and innovative network of local blogs on the web. While Gothamist's team did all the heavy lifting, it was still exciting to back them up on an ambitious and thoughtful redesign that launched at the end of last year. That redesign wasn't just skin deep; The site now takes smart advantage of the rich social features built in to Movable Type Pro.

But it wasn't until last week's heroic landing of US Air flight 1549 in the Hudson River that we got a great reminder of just how much Gothamist means to use as a definitive source of local news. The Gothamist post about the ditched plane wasn't just one of the first detailed stories, it was also one of the most frequently-updated. Dozens of people used the recommendation feature built into MT Pro to make it the most-recommended story on the site, and dozens more chimed in with their comments on the thread. And since our Six Apart Services team is headquartered in New York City, this was a great reminder of how much important reporting our clients do.

The truth is, blogs and social media being among the first to break big news stories is, well... old news. The more significant thing here is that this was a demonstrated success of a well-regarded network of blogs doing what it does best — serving its community in a personal and approachable way, right when they need information the most. So If you haven't done so lately, check out your own city's Gothamist site, and if you want to get the best team in the business backing your efforts, drop our Services team a line. If it isn't obvious, we pride ourselves on keeping a real, personal connection to the projects we collaborate on with our clients.

Originally posted by Anil Dash from Six Apart News &amp; Events, on January 19, 2009 10:19 AM

Today, Americans celebrate the birthday of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. One of the chief elements of the day, as expressed by Dr. King and manifested in recent years, is marking the day as a National Day of Service. The credo of a national service day is "a day on, not a day off," and citizens are encouraged to contribute their time and talents to community organizations in some way. A website USAService.org offers a Google gadget, from which you can find a service event near you that needs your help, or create your own. Inform others of your activities with text messages, and share your photos and feedback.

Remember, too, that the need for your skills and energy is great, and extends well beyond today. Please consider these organizations for future volunteer opportunities.

Posted by Karen Wickre, Google Blog team

Originally posted by Karen from The Official Google Blog, on January 19, 2009 9:39 AM

The BBC did a flight simulation of US Airways flight 1549 that shows what the water approach looked like from the cockpit. (thx, david)

Tags: video hudsonriverplanecrash flying nyc travel

Originally posted by jason@kottke.org from kottke.org, on January 19, 2009 8:21 AM

Somehow I completely missed the fact that in Bush's final press conference last week, he completely ignored Helen Thomas, who was sitting in the middle of the front row with her arm raised. Ouch.

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 19, 2009 7:55 AM

Today, on the eve of the inaugural, TPM is launching a new politics blog, TPMDC.com. It's the successor to TPM Election Central. Our team covering the Capital under the new administration will be Elana Schor, who joined our team earlier this month, covering Capitol Hill, Matt Cooper, formerly of Time, Newsweek, et al., covering the White House and the rest of the Obama administration and Eric Kleefeld, a veteran of our 2008 EC team, covering the political world from TPM Headquarters in NY.

First, let me welcome Matt Cooper to our TPM team (you can see his introductory post here). I've been a fan of Matt's for years. And we're excited to mix Matt's 20+ years of experience covering Washington, with all the insights and sources that entails, with the new approach to reporting we're working to create. We think both will add to the other.

We plan to hire one more reporter-blogger for the site; and David Kurtz and I will also be reporting and editing for the site.

The premise is simple. Though the phrase is endlessly overused, tomorrow is genuinely a new day in American politics. A new Democratic president, expanded Democratic majorities in the House and the Senate no longer encumbered by its earlier dependency on incumbency and legacy of solid South. And all of this beginning in a climate of genuine national crisis. We want to understand it. And we believe we are uniquely placed to chronicle the story.

As we have in every other project we've undertaken, we're doing this in partnership with you. We need your tips, your insights and your critiques. So if you're in the new administration, keep us posted on what you think is happening. And same to all of our reader-sources on Capitol Hill. And most importantly for our readers not residing within the Capital Beltway, we need your insights and perspective. We want to dig into the details of what's happening, understand the complexities and messiness of the city without becoming captive to its often insular mentality. In it but not of it.

On a personal note, TPM began just over eight years ago as a blog written from Washington. I moved to New York at the end of 2004. And it was from New York that we started growing TPM as an actual news outlet with multiple reporters in 2005. I'm still a little surprised at how much it's grown. And we have ambitious new plans for 2009.

So please visit the new site, take its measure, let us know your reactions and help us make it the best site covering the new Washington there is.

Originally posted by Josh Marshall from Talking Points Memo, on January 19, 2009 7:00 AM

Preparations for the inauguration ceremony tomorrow for the 44th President of the United States of America have been taking place for months now. Security, transportation, logistics, sanitation, everything you can think of to accomodate the predicted millions of attendees descending on Washington, D.C. President-elect Obama arrived in Washington by train, starting in Pennsylvania, passing through Wilmington and Baltimore. Here are some photographs of the various events and preparations taking place heading into tomorrow. (31 photos total)

Chris Bullock, of Landover, Md., checks to see that the letters on a three dimensional inauguration seal are fitting tightly, in preparation of Barack Obama's inauguration, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2009, at Hargrove Inc. in Lanham, Md. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from The Big Picture, on January 19, 2009 5:39 AM

I couldn’t find too many major stat totals equaling exactly 2009.

Carlos Delgado has 2009 games played:

  Cnt Player            Year   G  From  To   Ages   PA    AB    R    H   2B  3B  HR  RBI  BB  IBB  SO  HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB   CS   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  Positions Teams
+----+-----------------+----+----+----+----+-----+-----+-----+----+----+---+---+---+----+----+---+----+---+---+---+---+----+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+-----------+
    1 Carlos Delgado    2008 2009 1993 2008 21-36  8545  7189 1226 2010 476  17 469 1489 1097 186 1725 168   0  91 149   14   8  .280  .383  .546  .929 *3D/72    TOR-FLA-NYM

And Gil Hodges had 2009 runs produced:

  Cnt Player            Year  RPd From  To   Ages   G    PA    AB    R    H   2B  3B  HR  RBI  BB  IBB  SO  HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB   CS   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  Positions Teams
+----+-----------------+----+----+----+----+-----+----+-----+-----+----+----+---+---+---+----+----+---+----+---+---+---+---+----+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+-----------+
    1 Gil Hodges        1963 2009 1943 1963 19-39 2071  8104  7030 1105 1921 295  48 370 1274  943  31 1137  25  56  50 165   63  31  .273  .359  .487  .846 *3/275984 BRO-LAD-NYM

But that's it!

As a teaser for next year, there are 3 different guys with exactly 2010 career hits:

  Cnt Player            Year   H  From  To   Ages   G    PA    AB    R   2B  3B  HR  RBI  BB  IBB  SO  HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB   CS   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  Positions Teams
+----+-----------------+----+----+----+----+-----+----+-----+-----+----+---+---+---+----+----+---+----+---+---+---+---+----+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+-----------+
    1 Carlos Delgado    2008 2010 1993 2008 21-36 2009  8545  7189 1226 476  17 469 1489 1097 186 1725 168   0  91 149   14   8  .280  .383  .546  .929 *3D/72    TOR-FLA-NYM
    2 Mark Grudzielanek 2008 2010 1995 2008 25-38 1772  7484  6942  936 391  36  90  629  356  24  944 104  40  42 170  131  52  .290  .332  .395  .727 *46/5D    MON-TOT-LAD-CHC-STL-KCR
    3 Bobby Bonilla     2001 2010 1986 2001 23-38 2113  8255  7213 1084 408  61 287 1173  912 128 1204  28   5  97 169   45  57  .279  .358  .472  .830 5973/D81  TOT-PIT-NYM-TOT-BAL-FLA-NYM-ATL-STL

Interestingly, Delgado is on that list too, but of course he'll fall off both lists once he plays one or more games this coming season.

Originally posted by Andy from Stat of the Day, on January 19, 2009 3:41 AM

I have recently been asked about why it is that I dislike Shepard Fairey. Its actually not that I dislike Shepard as a person, its more that I have a big problem with his practices. I find them to be unethical and I believe that the political spectrum of people trying to make social change in the world will ultimately not benefit from his art. I believe that as artists and activists, we should be open about critiquing each other and open to changing how it is that we do things. That is what movements did before us .The Black Panthers consistently criticized each other in order to make assessments, and grow, as people, as an organization, and as a movement. We should never be closed to critique because in doing so we are doing ourselves a disservice. I would love to have the opportunity to talk to Shepard about my critiques, but the word on the street is that he does not like to debate about this stuff. Again, I have to say that this is not a personal attack, Shepard is actually in a book I co-edited with Josh MacPhee (also part of Just Seeds), Reproduce and Revolt, and it's not my intention to smear him nor censor him. Rather, my intention is to provide a look at his practices from the perspective a woman of color, an artist activist, and a person who thinks our capitalist system is very flawed.

Today a friend shared an article which you can read by clicking here. The title of the article is "Consumers of the World Unite," based on the phrase, "Workers of the World, Unite!" The title itself says alot of Fairey's practices, which is, that he commodifies political movements with the intention of making HUGE profits from them. Read the article and judge for yourself. It's sad to me that me that in our ultra consumer world, EVERYTHING is up for grabs when it's about profit. Very similar to how Hip Hop started in our communities, was even illegal in some forms, then repurposed, and is now sold back to us, by the very forces that also put our people in jail, deport our families, and push for bail outs in which the people ultimately pay the price. The article starts like this:

"SHOPPING, these days, is a political act. If you are brave enough to buy a $2,000 Prada handbag, you might rationalize that you are helping to stimulate the economy. Solidarity, people!"

Read more about Shepard Fairey's practices:

This article here was researched by a few of us in Just Seeds (Jesus Barraza, Josh MacPhee, and myself) as well as other notable voices in the world of political posters:
http://www.art-for-a-change.com/Obey/index.htm

This article here was written by my fellow co-editor and JustSeeder, Josh MacPhee:
http://www.justseeds.org/blog/2007/12/a_response_to_obey_plagiarist_1.html

This article was written originally for release in Mother Jones, but Mother Jones then refused to run it, and then instead ran a very pro-Fairey piece:
http://nyc.indymedia.org/en/2008/06/97988.html

Here is an open letter to Shepard from a powerful sister who works at KPFK, Aura Bogado.
http://tothecurb.wordpress.com/2008/05/29/i-have-a-name-an-open-letter-to-shepard-fairey/

Originally posted by Favianna from Just Seeds: Blog, on January 18, 2009 9:19 PM

This one's been kicking around in my head for a while, and maybe you can all help me understand it. With any contemporary social networking site, I can control who has access to the things I share, and I can update or change or revoke the relationships that enable that access at any time.

For example, I can share a photo on Flickr with just my friends, or a post on Vox with just my family, or display my profile on Facebook to just my contacts. And then, if somebody ceases to be my friend, I can change their status and they no longer have access to that information. It's a unliateral, technologically enforced restriction, and circumventing the restriction would be tantamount to hacking and likely to get you banned from any of these services.

So, with all of that being said, how are privacy settings on social networks different than DRM restrictions placed on media content files from companies? Is it because I'm not a corporation? Is it because the DRM technology is provided by Flickr or Facebook instead of by Apple's iTunes or Microsoft's WIndows Media? Is it because I only (theoretically) grant permissions to dozens or hundreds of people, instead of millions?

This is a genuine question, because it's something I'm not sure I know how to articulate. I can certainly identify the difference in intent, but I am not sure I can explain the difference in definition. Feel free to comment here, or post a link or reply to @anildash on Twitter and I'll collect the best explanations I get.

Originally posted by Anil from Anil Dash, on January 18, 2009 9:16 PM

Many of us know Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 "I Have a Dream" speech from snippets and news clips. If you have time for reflection today, watch it here, all the way through. It's unmissable. In an era of open injustice and brutal hatred, King challenges his listeners to actively build a better world for themselves and their children. We know the highlights, but watching the whole 16-minute speech makes the context of '63 shatteringly clear, and underscores the clarity and power of MLK's vision.

Get a transcript >>

Originally posted by (author unknown) from TED Blog, on January 18, 2009 5:52 PM

Video from earlier today of Josh Groban singing "my country tis of thee" at Obama "We Are One" Inaugural Concert.

Here are the songs performed at the event: source Mstr. Sgt. Caleb Green: "The Star-Spangled Banner" Bruce Springsteen: "The Rising" Mary J. Blige: "Lean On Me" Bettye LaVette and Jon Bon Jovi: "A Change Is Gonna Come" James Taylor, John Legend and Jennifer Nettles: "Shower the People" John Mellencamp: "Pink Houses" Josh Groban and Heather Headley: "My Country 'Tis of Thee" will.i.am, Sheryl Crow and Herbie Hancock: "One Love" Renee Fleming: "You'll Never Walk Alone" Garth Brooks: "American Pie"/"Shout"/"We Shall Be Free" (medley) Stevie Wonder, Usher and Shakira: "Higher Ground" U2: "Pride (In the Name of Love)"/"City of Blinding Lights" Pete Seeger, Bruce Springsteen and Tao Rodriguez-Seeger: "This Land Is Your Land" Beyonce and Ensemble: "America the Beautiful"

Josh Groban at Obama "We Are One" Concert (VIDEO) Josh Groban at Obama "We Are One" Concert (VIDEO)

Originally posted by jay smooth from tuberaider video, on January 18, 2009 3:56 PM

I think that if there is any one thing that distinguishes a happy cook from one who is constantly frazzled (of course there is no one thing) it is in manner in which we approach the act of cooking. A contented cook makes sure that everything is put into place before any real cooking occurs. All of the ingredients are cut, apportioned and arranged in the order in which they will be cooked so that once the cooking commences, everything falls into place at the appropriate moment. It is out of the frisson of order that the joy of cooking occurs. There is no way to find contentment in cooking if its prelude is not orderly.
The photo shows the partial mise en place (total mise en place would include pots, pans etc.) for a meal that I cooked for my family on 1.12.09. The apple is incongruous and was not used in this meal.

The best sauce in the world is hunger.

Originally posted by Bob del Grosso from A Hunger Artist, on January 18, 2009 8:00 AM

On Tap, Lisa La Touche from Alaina Browne on Vimeo.

I'm in the goals not resolutions camp, but if I had to claim one New Year's resolution this year, it's to see more dance performances—partly because I feel like I often do a poor job of taking full-advantage of all the city has to offer, and partly because (here it comes) watching a couple of seasons of So You Think You Can Dance has made me a real fan of dance and dancers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So maybe SYTYCD is not "serious" dance but it's accessible, and fun, and inspiring, and makes me feel good. Seems like a good thing, right?

To get my resolution rollin', earlier this month I went to see On Tap with a friend who thankfully shares (at least temporarily) my enthusiasm for my New Year's resolution. We sat right at the stage's edge, and enjoyed an hour or so of tap dancing up close (VERY up close) and personal. It was fun, and entertaining, and inspiring, just as I had suspected. This is going to be a resolution I can keep.

Originally posted by Alaina from alaina browne lives here, on January 18, 2009 5:23 AM

Two nice forms of street critique spotted today: Above, in Berlin, someone's been wheatpasting Photoshop toolbars onto ads featuring digitally airbrushed models. Below, graffiti report card that allows passersby to grade skill, daring and overall impact of tags and murals. As WebUrbanist writes, apparently some street artists aren't fond of having their unsanctioned works graded.

Earlier: Street-art pricetags

Originally posted by Paul Schmelzer from Eyeteeth: A journal of incisive ideas., ReBlogged by andreapolli on Jan 18, 2009 at 10:16 AM

Originally posted by Paul Schmelzer from Eyebeam reBlog, on January 18, 2009 5:16 AM

While we don’t cover bike racing here much, Lance’s return is certainly news that’ll impact our beat and we hope re-energize a bike economy that had a gas-price boom and then subsequently crashed with everything else. In Europe,

• The Independent wrote about Lance Fever
• The BBC has video with Lance ruling out a comeback win
• and another fever article from the BBC.

Number 11

Lance’s first race number in a long time. Photo Credit: Lance Armstrong from his Twitterstream.

Understanding better how global Lance is, there wasn’t a ride we did recently in Kona where he wasn’t mentioned to us by the locals. We’ll cover the cultural aspects of Lance and his influence on the sport, industry, and in the local bike shops.

For Lance’s first race back, the Tour Down Under check our post about racing sites and blogs we read. Also follow Lance on Twitter, where he’s posting updates and photos from the races.

Originally posted by DL Byron from Bike Hugger, on January 18, 2009 4:45 AM